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The scheduled date of 16 May for a new invitation to tender for concessions to manage online slots as well as video lottery terminals (VLTs) has come and gone, and now one can only wait for the next date to be announced. It will certainly not be before September, say the usual well-informed sources, to coincide with the resumption of work after the summer break.
But that delay of a few months could serve to refine a number of issues concerning the delicate question of the network concessions. Concessions that, it is fair to say, do not appear to be a problem for the ten operating companies that had already entered the market back in 2004.
When introducing VLT terminals to the market, the licensed network operating companies have to pay an amount equal to €15,000 for each right to a VLT installation. The exercise of this option in conjunction with the other requirements contained in the decrees from the AAMS, the Italian gaming regulator, has given the existing operators the right to request and be awarded the new concessions as continuations of the current ones, for the next nine years with effect from 1 November 2010.
It goes without saying, then, that even taking into account the deadline of December 2011, by which time they must be allocated, few of the companies seem to be worried about the date for the execution of the new concessions.
In this regard Snai explains that “with the provisions of the Abruzzo decree, VLT terminals have been introduced into the Italian market and these provisions allow the existing holders of the network concessions to use the Comma 6a terminals [slot machines] in an experimental manner up to 2019”.
Sisal provides more detail: “The concessions were valid until 31 October 2010 in respect to gaming machines with winnings and, as a result of the procedures necessary to grant a new concession for the management of legal online gaming networks to the existing holders of the concessions who had applied before 20 November 2009 and who had been authorised to install the VLTs, such concessions will expire on 31 October 2019”.
The current concession-holders have had to do nothing but apply and then be awarded the new concessions; the addendum to the agreement which governs the collection of takings from gaming with VLTs was in fact signed by the ten licensed companies in March 2010.
This is how it works for the licensed companies that already operate in the market, but what is expected of those who aspire to enter it?
First, the future concession-holder must submit a statement of their commitment to install, within six months of the provisional award, a minimum number of gaming machines, equal to 5000 slots and a quantity of VLTs which under no circumstances can exceed 14 percent of the number of slots requested. To venture down this path, then, you have to have at least €15m, a figure that covers the cost of the rights for approximately 700 VLTs, the payment of the guarantees for at least 5000 slots, the technological infrastructure and the management costs.
Then there are the financial conditions. The applicants must demonstrate that in the two years 2008-2009 they had “a turnover of at least €30m”.
Everything’s clear, it would seem, apart from the opening date for the invitation to tender and after that a wait that could last for several months. No more than three or four, hope the operators...
