44 PUBLIC GAMING INTERNATIONAL • JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2022 PULSE of the Industry These news stories comprise a very small fraction of the gaming and lottery news stories posted every day to PublicGaming.com. Too, these stories are the highly edited short versions. You can visit our news website PublicGaming.com and access all of its departments for free, including search to read the full version of the articles. Sign up for our free e-newsletter by sending your e-mail address to sjason@publicgaming.com. NORTH AMERICAN NEWS Launching the Women's Initiative in Lottery Leadership 2022 Mentorship Program Congratulations to May Scheve Reardon, Executive Director, Missouri Lottery for taking the reigns of the Women's Initiative in Lottery Leadership Mentorship Program in 2022. This program will launch in January of 2022. Visit WomeninLotteryLeadership.com to access forms to download, complete and return to us as possible. Email your form to mentorprogram@ WomeninLotteryLeadership.com. Five Finalists of POWERBALL First Millionaire of the Year Promotion Revealed MRC Live & Alternative and POWERBALL® revealed today the five finalists in the “POWERBALL First Millionaire of the Year” promotion. For the third consecutive year, POWERBALL will hold a special drawing for the $1 million prize just after midnight ET on ABC’s broadcast of “Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2022.” As previously announced, country artist Jessie James Decker will return as POWERBALL® correspondent for her third year and will provide live updates throughout the evening, checking in with finalists celebrating at their homes across the country, before revealing the “POWERBALL First Millionaire of the Year” just after midnight on January 1, 2022. Participating lottery jurisdictions included Arizona, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana (Hoosier), Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Virgin Islands, Vermont, and Washington D.C. Last year, “Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest” took viewers to each of the five finalists’ hometowns. Just after midnight, Carlos Mabry from Washington, D.C. was named the 2021 POWERBALL First Millionaire of the Year. In 2020, Blaine Marston from Passadumkeag, Maine was named the inaugural POWERBALL First Millionaire of the Year. For more information on the “POWERBALL First Millionaire of the Year” promotion, please visit www.powerballrockineve.com. Scientific Games Advances Original iGaming Content Offering and Production Capabilities with Acquisition of ELK Studios Pairing innovative studio with OpenGaming™ unlocks significant opportunity to distribute top-ranked games in the U.S. market. ELK Studios is a Stockholm-based developer with a long history of producing carefully crafted games with ground-breaking mathematics, superb artwork and a mobile-first focus. The highly profitable digital studio's hit releases include Wild Toro II, Katmandu and Cygnus, and its games also feature the innovative X-iter™ tool allowing players to jump into the action through a selection of special predefined modes. Scientific Games Corporation will now provide its AToM™ cashless table game solution to operators around the globe after completing the acquisition of ACS’ PlayOn AToM, which stands for Access To On Demand Money, provides players with a seamless debit solution at live table games by letting them access funds without having to leave their seats. In addition, there are no back-end or out-ofnetwork transaction fees charged by the player’s financial institution. To access funds, players simply swipe their debit card and enter their PIN. The AToM solution is currently live on 650 table games in California, Nevada and New Mexico and is approved for use in New Jersey. Scientific Games adds Wazdan slot games to the Open Gaming platform The two companies will work closely together to offer players high quality, mobile-first games in the states of New Jersey and West Virginia, starting in the first quarter of 2022. Founded in 2010, Wazdan has grown rapidly in recent years, releasing over 140 games in 17 jurisdictions worldwide, including new and established European markets such as the UK, Malta, Sweden, Denmark, Lithuania, Spain, Italy and Greece. Wazdan’s focus on the North American market will intensify in the coming months, with the Malta-based studio currently in the process of finalising supplier licences in Michigan and Pennsylvania. Scientific Games to Expand Connecticut Lottery’s Digital Player Engagement and second-chance drawing platform with New, Five-Year Contract The contract, which may be extended up to three years, also includes Scientific Games’ NextGen® mobile app and award-winning customer relationship management services. The second-chance program is scheduled to launch in
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