2005 Lottery Industry Hall of Fame Members
Ralph BatchFormer Director of the New Jersey, Illinois, and Delaware Lotteries
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION : Ralph Batch was chosen for the Lottery Industry Hall of Fame for his pioneering of much of what are the foundations of modern lotteries including the laws, operating procedures and management practices, for his generous assistance to all of the US lotteries that came into existence during his many years in the industry, for setting the standard for lottery
advertising and for encouraging the development of technology for lotteries. He is one of the two early lottery directors to whom the US lottery industry is most indebted. Ralph Batch made his first mark on the history of the lottery industry when he was appointed to chair a commission studying the feasibility of starting a lottery in New Jersey. His subsequent work with the start-up of that lottery, as well as his leadership in the launch of the Illinois Lottery and revitalization the Delaware Lottery, lead to him being named by Public Gaming Research Institute, "Dean of State Lottery Directors." Batch believed that the lottery industry was a worthwhile investment for governments as an alternative of additional taxation. He actively encouraged the exchange of ideas and information between lottery organizations. In 1971 he co-founded and became the first president of the National Association of State Lotteries, now known as the North American Association of State and Provincial Lotteries. Throughout his distinguished career, Batch was a champion of technology and innovation and of quality lottery advertising. He believed that such quality advertising would contribute to greater public acceptance of lotteries. The NASPL Batchy Awards for advertising honor his memory by recognizing lottery advertising that achieves the level of excellence Batch promoted throughout his career. Upon his retirement from the directorship of the Delaware Lottery, Ralph joined Public Gaming Research Institute as a consultant and Member of the Board so that he could continue helping people in the lottery industry. PGRI honored Ralph Batch in the past with the “Lottery Lifetime Achievement Award” and PGRI honors the memory of him with his induction into the Lottery Industry Hall of Fame. |
Daniel BowerCo-founder and former President & Chairman of Scientific Games, Inc.
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Dan Bower was co-developer of the secure, scratch-off lottery tickets that are so important today to the revenue success of government lotteries everywhere. The "instant" lottery ticket that he helped create and make successful revolutionized the modern lottery industry.
Dan Bower co-founded Scientific Games in 1973 and played an instrumental role in the development of instant lottery games in North America throughout the '70s and 80's. At Scientific Games, he provided consultancy services and marketing assistance to more than two dozen lotteries in the United States and Canada, before joining British American Banknote (BABN) as marketing consultant in 1988. From 1991–1994, he served as Chairman of Automated Wagering International before becoming Co-Chairman of Tele-Com Productions. State and international lotteries have benefited from TeleCom's creativity and winning brands since 1986, when "Let's Go to the Races®" made its debut in Barbados. TeleCom licenses various board game trademarks for the lottery industry and has done business in over 40 lottery jurisdictions. The company also supports its own line of original games. Dan, 70, lives in Atlanta, Georgia, He is married and has four children and eight grandchildren. He graduated from Ohio State University in 1954 and served in the United States Air Force as a radar controller for three years before embarking upon a career in marketing and advertising. Prior to joining the lottery industry, he held management positions at The Kroger Company, Fisher Foods and J&H International Corporation. During the 2002 Convention in Adelaide, Dan Bower became the second recipient of the WLA's Guy Simonis Lifetime Achievement Award for outstanding service to the lottery industry. |
Doris & Duane BurkeFounders of Public Gaming Research Institute
(selected by other 2005 Hall of Fame members) Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: As founders of the Lottery Industry Hall of Fame, Doris and Duane Burke of Public Gaming Research Institute had no thought of being selected for this honor, which was intended for those who have made important contributions to the long-term successes of government lotteries. Those individuals selected by PGRI for 2005, however, thought otherwise. They subsequently chose Doris and Duane to be honored also for their contributions to lottery
education, for assisting lottery and industry managers and for the promotion of integrity in lottery management and operations over the past 35 years. Doris and Duane were surprised by this recognition from those who they admire but sincerely appreciate the honor. Doris and Duane Burke started what is today Public Gaming Research Institute, Inc. (PGRI) in 1971 as a vehicle for helping people in government and industry interested in using state lotteries and other government sponsored gaming to raise money for good causes. From the fall of 1974 to the middle of 1980 Duane was also the registered lobbyist for the National Association of State Lotteries and is credited with helping defeat Federal government efforts to restrict the operation and growth of state lotteries. PGRI is now in its 35th year of continuous service to this industry of which it has been a part almost since the beginning of modern lotteries in North America and throughout the modernization of lotteries throughout the world. Its objective remains the same as when the company was founded, to help the people and institutions committed to raising money for good causes. They are the publishers of Public Gaming International magazine and PGRI’s International Morning Report and are organizers of two lottery industry conferences each year – SMART-Tech and International Lottery Expo & ILAC Congress. They are also owners of a Guatemalan company that operates video lottery salons, a portion of whose revenues support children’s health programs there. Duane was previously in engineering and computing with the Boeing Company and its subsidiary Boeing Computer Services for the twenty years prior to he and Doris starting Public Gaming. Duane is a graduate of the University of Washington in Seattle with a Bachelor of Sciences Degree in Electrical Engineering. Doris attend schools in Topeka, Kansas and at the University of Washington. |
Gordon GravesFounder and former chairman Multi-Media Games
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Gordon Graves was selected for the Lottery Industry Hall of Fame for his pioneering leadership in the development of on-line computer systems for lotteries and for his leadership in developing player activated terminals for the sale of lottery products.
Gordon Graves was CEO of Datatrol, Inc. when that company won a contract to install the first on-line lottery system in Michigan in 1976. The company installed the first on-line lotto system in the world in Canada in 1978 and, after Graves had left, went on to become GTECH, the largest lottery supplier in the world. In 1981, Gordon founded a company called Syntech, Inc. that developed the first player-activated lottery terminal, the first microcomputer-based redundant central determinant system, and the first touch-screen gaming terminal. In 1986, Graves sold control of Syntech to IGT, and he not only participated in IGT’s entry into the lottery business, but also was involved in the development of MegaBucks, the first progressive slot machine game. In 1990, Gordon founded a company called TV Bingo, Inc., which evolved into Austin-based Multimedia Games, Inc. (MGAM). Gordon became CEO of MGAM in 1994 and, in 2003, was named “best performing Chief Executive Officer in the gaming industry” during an awards ceremony hosted by the American Gaming Association in Las Vegas, Nevada. “To put it in perspective, Mr. Graves was underpaid as CEO of Multimedia Games for the past three years by nearly 100 percent, based on the criteria used by our company,” said Stephen Goebels, a representative of HVS Executive Search, who presented the award. “Our criteria are based on the performance of the company over a three-year period, market capitalization, stock price and return to the investor,” explained Goebels. “Multimedia Games excelled in all of these levels.” Prior to this award being presented to Gordon, The Investor’s Business Daily newspaper reported that MGAM had increased in value at the highest rate of any company on Wall Street in 2001. Gordon retired from MGAM in 2003. Today he serves on the board of directors of Cash Systems, Inc., a credit card cash advance company and The Graves Foundation, a charitable foundation supporting health and education grants. He serves as chairman of the board of Graves Management, Inc. (GMI). GMI is an investment management company that manages most of the assets of the Graves family. Those assets are invested in a wide spectrum of financial instruments and market segments, with the heaviest concentration being in gaming companies. GMI is the majority shareholder of AcesWired, LLC, a limited liability start-up company that operates amusement games. |
Dr. John KozaCo-founder and former Chairman & CEO of Scientific Games, Inc.
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Dr. John R. Koza was chosen for the Lottery Industry Hall of Fame for his leadership in creating the instant/scratch-off lottery product and in making it such an important part of lotteries today. He is also honored for his leadership in helping to start many of todays successful lotteries.
John R. Koza received his PhD in Computer Science from the University of Michigan in 1972. From 1973 to 1987, he was chairman, CEO, and co-founder (with Daniel W. Bower) of Scientific Games Inc. which introduced the rub-off instant lottery ticket to state government lotteries, pushed for legalization of lotteries in numerous states (including by initiative petition in Arizona, California, and Oregon), and served as startup consultant for over a dozen state lotteries. Since leaving Scientific Games in 1978, John R. Koza has been involved in venture capital investing and has taught a course on genetic algorithms and genetic programming at Stanford University since 1988. He is consulting professor in the Biomedical Informatics Program in the Department of Medicine and in the Department of Electrical Engineering at Stanford University. He has served on both the Science Board and Board of Trustees of the Santa Fe Institute. He is author of four books on genetic programming, including the 2003 book "Genetic Programming IV: Routine Human-Competitive Machine Intelligence." Genetic programming is method for automatically creating computer programs. It starts from a high-level a high-level statement of what needs to be done and breeds a population of programs over many generations. Genetic programming now routinely delivers high-return humancompetitive machine intelligence. In addition, genetic programming is an automated invention machine. Among the four dozen human-competitive results produced so far by genetic programming, there are 21 instances where genetic programming has created an entity that either infringes or duplicates the functionality of a previously patented 20th-century invention, 7 instances where genetic programming has done the same with respect to an invention patented after January 1, 2000, and 2 instances where genetic programming has created a patentable new invention. These humancompetitive results come from the fields of the automated design of analog electrical circuits, controllers, antennas, optical lens systems, mechanical systems, quantum computing circuits, and algorithms. John has made clear that there is definitely life after lottery. |
Jean Marc LaFailleFormer President of
Loto-Quebec Country: CANADA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Jean Marc Lafaille was chosen for his pioneering and management of Canadian lotteries and for his leadership in international lottery affairs.
A lawyer and economist, Mr. Lafaille began his career on January 1st 1970 as the first employee of Loto-Québec, the first State Lottery organization in Canada, serving as Secretary of the Board and Legal Counsel. The launch in 1971 of the first lotto game in North America, a 4/10 named Loto-Perfecta, was the result of the contacts he established with the off-track betting organization in France and the Westdeutsche Lottery in Germany, directed at that time by Lothar Lammers. In 1974, Mr. Lafaille organized in Québec the first congress in North America of the International Association of State Lotteries. In 1976, he left Loto-Québec to establish the Atlantic Lottery Corporation and served as the company's first General Manager. He returned to Loto-Québec in 1977 where he held the post of CEO for eight years. He developed turnover from $100M to $800M per annum, totally reengineered the company adopting the administrative structure of large groups distributing consumer goods. With his colleagues of the other Canadian lotteries, he launched in 1982 the first multi-State lotto game in North America, the Lotto 6/49. He left the gaming industry in 1985 but returned one year later when he established GTECH's first European office. He was President of GTECH Europe SA, based in Brussels, until September 2001. Named “man of the year in Public Gaming” in 1978 by the PGRI, during his 15 years on the lottery side and 15 years on the supplier side, Mr. Lafaille has been an active participant in NASPL, as international vice-president in 1980-1982, in the International Association of State Lotteries, as member of the executive committee and secretary general, and he is an honorary member of the World Lottery Association. In addition to writing a book on the gaming industry with his friend Guy Simonis, Mr. Lafaille has started providing training courses and will offer consultant services to gaming organizations. He also has non-gaming business activities. |
Lothar LammersFormer Managing Director of German Lottery, co-inventor of modern Loto games
Country: GERMANY |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Lothar Lammers was chosen to be honored for his pioneering achievement of co-inventing the modern lotto game, a foundation of modern lotteries, for his leadership in lottery management and for his contributions to the international lottery industry.
Lothar Lammers is widely recognized as the father of the modern lotto game, which Peter Weiand and he introduced at Westdeutsche Lotterie GmbH in the 1950s. Lammers later provided wide support to other lotteries as the new format gained momentum around the world. As Managing Director of Westdeutsche Lotterie GmbH for almost thirty years, Lothar Lammers nurtured the new lotto game from its rebirth through to maturity, pioneering a series of successful enhancements that were quickly emulated throughout the worldwide lottery community. Throughout his career, he has been a valued consultant to lottery and casino organizations worldwide. His achievements went well beyond the scope of lotto. Westdeutsche Lotterie was the first organization to launch a special lottery to fund the Olympics Games, for example. It was also the first to screen an hour-long television lottery entertainment show, and the first to offer lotto-style betting on horse races. Lammers was also the first lottery director to also operate casinos. He was Chairman of the advertising, public relations and marketing committee of Germany’s Lotto and Toto Bloc from 1965 to 1986, and a member of the Executive Committee of the European Football Pool from 1985 to 1989. He served as a member of the Intertoto Executive Committee from 1980 until 1985, and as Intertoto President from 1985 until 1989. Recognized for his dedication to the development of sports betting and its role in the sports economy, he was instrumental in the expansion of Intertoto in North America and Australasia. He was made an Honorary Member of Intertoto in 1989. Germany awarded Lothar Lammers the Red Cross Order of Merit in 1978 and the Order of Merit 1st Class in 1984. Finland made him a member of the Order of the Lion in 1978, and he received France's Ordre National du Mérite in 1987. |
Victor MarkowiczCo-founder and former
co-chairman of GTECH Corporation Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Victor Markowicz was chosen for his success in codeveloping
on-line lotteries, as co-developer of the billion-dollar GTECH Corporation, and for helping to bring on-line games to lotteries around the world. Victor Markowicz was co-founder of the GTECH Corporation, is a software industry leader and has been a driving force behind the American phenomena of state lotteries. Victor was born in Siberia where his parents, holocaust escapees from Poland, had been deported to Soviet labor camps at the onset of World War II. He spent his childhood and adolescence in Poland studying mathematics at the University of Warsaw. In 1964 the Markowicz family immigrated to Israel where Victor continued his studies in mathematics at the Technion Institute in Haifa. During this time, he joined a team of young technologists who designed Israel’s first commercial computer. ELBIT 100. Shortly after he arrived in 1970 to the United States penniless but enthusiastic, Markowicz associated himself with Mathematica Corporation of Princeton, New Jersey, a government consulting company. An assignment to apply computer technology to the New Jersey State Lottery Corporation sealed his fate as a lottery entrepreneur. Later, he and two colleagues founded Gaming Dimensions Inc., a lottery technology corporation in Providence, Rhode Island, which today has grown into GTECH Corporation, a world leading supplier and designer of computerized lottery systems. Starting in Rhode Island with one customer in 1976, GTECH became a New York Stock Exchange traded global enterprise with over 5000 employees and $1B in annual revenue. GTECH operates and or provides lottery systems to over 80 government lotteries around the world. Victor played an instrumental role in GTECH’s growth, serving as Co-Chairman of the company until his retirement in 1998. A Snapshot of Victor Markowicz’s Lottery Experience Grew GTECH, the world’s leading on-line lottery supplier, to a $1B global business; Capitalized the company, through 2 IPOs and 1 LBO, creating significant value for shareholders, customers and employees; Helped craft the games, security systems, implementations and governmental regulations that today continue to frame the global lottery marketplace; Traveled the world, encountering various gaming cultures, customs and people, to help implement lottery funding for good causes; Became a philanthropist, involved in contributing to the arts, films and cultural programs – especially those in his native Poland; Led the growing global lottery industry -- with other supplier executives, lottery chiefs and government officials -- to become a trusted source of worldwide revenue for good causes. |
Tim NymanFormer key executive with GTECH
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Tim Nyman was chosen for his pioneering work in the on-line lottery field and for his leadership in making on-line lotteries a foundation for the success of lotteries around the world.
Today, it is readily acknowledged that the lottery industry is the globally pre-eminent vehicle for raising revenues for good causes. Billions are generated annually. GTECH is the leading provider of technology solutions and content to the industry. There are very few people today in the lottery industry or at GTECH that have been part of the creation and evolution of the on-line lottery industry. There are even fewer who have played a key role in creating a vision for the industry’s future and driving its implementation. One of those select few, Tim Nyman, has been and continues to be at the forefront of the lottery industry’s advancement and GTECH’s growth. Joining Datatrol in 1979, Tim was witness to the lottery industry’s earliest origins and GTECH’s creation as the core of Datatrol’s business in lottery would ultimately form the nucleus of GTECH. As two other honorees and GTECH’s founders, Guy Snowden and Victor Markowitz, have often noted, in those early days, the lottery industry was a handful of entrepreneurs and GTECH’s assets amounted to a few desks, a waste paper basket, some contracts of undetermined value, a vision and a couple of people that believed in what lottery could become. Tim Nyman was there and his contribution to GTECH’s success and the industry’s growth is woven into our collective histories. Today, GTECH is a $1.2 billion company and Tim Nyman is Senior Vice President of Global operations overseeing 2500 employees and over $900 million in revenues. There a few stories like Tim’s in any industry. As GTECH experienced explosive growth, Tim took on positions of increasing authority in almost every aspect of GTECH’s operations. He has a remarkable ability to adapt, excel and thrive through change. That is the hallmark of any successful business leader. It defines Tim Nyman’s career and it is why his is being inducted into the Lottery Industry’s hall of fame. |
Rebecca Paul HargroveChief Executive Officer of the Tennessee Education Lottery Corp.
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Rebecca Paul Hargrove is being honored for her outstanding and unmatched start-up and management of lotteries in the United States, for co-founding the very successful, multi-state game, Mega Millions and for her leadership in North American and world
lottery associations. Rebecca Paul Hargrove is a 22-year lottery industry veteran. She began her career working in local television news, advertising and promotions in Indiana and Illinois before being tapped in 1985 by former Illinois Governor James Thompson to lead the Illinois Lottery. Under her management, Illinois Lottery sales climbed to more than $1.3 billion annually. In 1987, she moved to Florida to launch the Sunshine State's lottery where she set industry records for first-year sales. After that, she worked as a consultant, developing strategic plans and advising lotteries across the U.S. and abroad. In 1993, Hargrove was tapped to start up the Georgia Lottery. During the first year of operation, she once again set new industry sales records. During her 10 years in the Peach State, the Georgia Lottery generated more than $6 billion for education. In 2003, Hargrove was selected as the Tennessee Lottery's first president and CEO. After starting ticket sales three weeks ahead of schedule on January 20, the Tennessee Lottery closed out its first fiscal year of five months and 12 days by transferring more than $123 million to the state’s education fund—roughly 40 percent more than the initial goal of $88 million. By March 2005, gross ticket sales had surpassed $1 billion after one year and seven weeks of ticket sales. In April 2007, the Tennessee Lottery transferred $78.7 million to the state’s Lottery for Education Account making it the second-highest transfer on record – pushing the amount raised for education to over $842.6 million and reinforcing the Lottery’s role in creating a brighter future for education in the state. Fiscal year 2007 brought the Tennessee Lottery another record breaking year with a return of $284.2 million to education, bringing the total raised since inception to over $919 million. Gross sales for the fiscal year, which ended June 30, were over $1 billion—gross sales since inception are over $3.3 billion. Hargrove's resume includes a long list of lottery industry, business and civic accomplishments. In 1990, she served as President of the International Lottery Association. From 1997 to 1998, she served as president of NASPL. She was the recipient of PGRI’s 1998 Peter O'Connell Lifetime Achievement Award. In 1999, she served as vice chairman of the Public Sector Gaming Study Commission appointed by the National Council of Legislators from Gaming States. Her many honors also include being named one of 2005’s “Tennessean’s of the Year” by The Tennessean newspaper, Business Tennessee magazines “Power 100,” a list of Tennessee’s most powerful people, and being named "Entrepreneur of the Year" by the Stanford Graduate School of Business Alumni Association. |
Ed PowersFormer director of the New Hampshire Lottery, the first U.S. lottery
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Ed Powers started the first lottery in modern times in the United States, lead the fight against the Federal Government for states rights to operate lotteries and set the example for integrity in lottery operations for all subsequent lotteries.
Edward Powers was more than a lottery pioneer– he was the U.S. lottery industry’s equivalent of the Lewis and Clark expedition. In 1964 he was appointed Director of the New Hampshire Sweepstakes Commission in 1964, the first lottery in modern times in the US, and thus became the “Father of Modern-Day Lotteries.” He spent much of his career in the lottery industry leading the removal of obstacles to state-operated lotteries and championing states rights at a time when the federal government was attempting to impede the use of lotteries as an alternative to increased taxation. Although the first lottery game in New Hampshire was a copy of the Irish Sweepstakes, a game widely sold illegally in those days, Ed was always at the forefront of adopting new products and technologies to increase the New Hampshire Lottery’s revenues. Prior to his career as a Lottery director, Powers headed several FBI field offices and was the Special Agent in Charge of the FBI field office in Boston that broke the Brinks Robbery case, a $6 million heist that, at the time, was the largest armored car robbery ever. Still, as heralded as his pre-lottery days were, he is best remembered in this industry for the more than 25-years in which he consistently exhibited the drive, commitment and integrity which were emulated by his generation of lottery employees and the generations that followed. Upon retirement from the Lottery, Ed became a consultant to Public Gaming Research Institute and then to a number of other companies including MDI. During his lifetime, PGRI honored Ed Powers by presenting him with the “Lottery Lifetime Achievement Award.” In 2005 PGRI is pleased to honor Ed posthumously with induction into the Lottery Industry Hall of Fame. |
Steve SaferinFounder of MDI; President, Properties, Chief Creative Officer Scientific Games, Inc.
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Steve Saferin is being recognized for his early innovations in lottery advertising and for the invention and implementation of licensed games in the lottery industry - one of the most important products in the world lottery industry today.
Duane Burke, CEO of Public Gaming Research Institute is quoted as saying, “Nearly 20 years ago my good friend Ed Powers told me he had signed on as a consultant to a small production company from Texas who wanted to produce commercials about lottery winners. He said they would be attending my next conference in Boca Raton and bringing Jeopardy! Host Alex Trebeck. Over the years lots of businesses and individuals show up at various lottery functions lured by the “big numbers” of our industry. Sadly most don’t stay around very long. “We are happy to say that Steve Saferin and MDI are very real exceptions to that. Not only have they stayed around and prospered, they have brought our industry some truly creative and profitable products and brought us all a lot of fun and entertainment at our shows.” Steve started MDI in January 1986, and the company in 2005 is kicking off its 20th anniversary celebrations. Steve left his position as Director of Programming at ESPN to launch his career as an entrepreneur. He has a journalism degree from American University and was a sports writer at The Washington Post. He holds a law degree from the University of Maryland and worked as an attorney for the Federal Communications Commission and Viacom International serving as Showtime’s first lawyer when it was founded in 1977. He serves on the Deans Advisory Committee for the School of Communications at American University and endowed the Steve Saferin Sports Communications Program at the school. Steve did produce those lottery commercials about winners, filming over 80 spots entitled “The New Millionaires with Alex Trebeck”. In 1996 Steve and MDI acquired their first license for lottery games—The Twilight Zone. Today they have over 80 marketing partnerships with some of the best known brands in the world. As most of you know, in 2003 MDI was acquired by Scientific Games and later that year Steve was named to his current position as President of Scientific Games Ventures. But what you may not know and what I find amazing is that in 2005 SGI will print in excess of $2.3 billion in licensed games bearing the marks of the various licenses owned by MDI. |
Guy SimonisFormer President of the British Columbia and Western Canada Lotteries; Founding President of the WLA
Country: CANADA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Guy Simonis is one of the true pioneers in the North American lottery industry. He is being honored for his leadership and many achievements in Canadian lotteries and for his leadership in the world lottery industry.
Born in the Netherlands, Simonis emigrated to Canada in 1954 at age 23. In 1974 he was asked to lead the formation and later headed, the Western Canada Lottery Foundation, which encompassed the four Western Canadian Provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia. In 1985 Simonis headed the British Columbia Lottery when it broke away from its 10-year association with the Foundation. In addition to pioneering Lotto 6/49 (1982) and sports lotteries (1988) in Canada, and among many other lottery innovations he spearheaded the development of Electronic Bingo opening the world’s first fully operational hall, anywhere in 1988. In 1998 management and conduct of all casinos in British Columbia were added to his responsibility as President of the British Columbia Lottery Corporation. Simonis was a leading figure in industry development. He was President of North American Association of State and Provincial Lotteries (1985-87) the first Canadian to be so honored. On the international scene he headed the world’s major lottery industry associations:
As a follow-up to his Presidency of NASPL Simonis introduced an industry-training program called the Erewhon State Lottery. Originally intended as a one-time study for lottery directors, the program became the premier training program of the lottery industry. Over 600 middle management personnel on five continents have participated in the program. Simonis has created home studies on CD ROM in game design for Lotto, Keno, 3 and 4-digit numbers games and the instant game. Many new additions to lottery staff gain an immediate insight into the intricacies of lotteries that would otherwise be absorbed through trial and experience. Now conducting lectures and seminars on lotteries and gaming, he lives with his wife of nearly 50 years on the Pacific Coast of Canada within a few minutes’ walk from the United States. The couple has four mature children, a son and three daughters. Four grandchildren are in Atlanta, Georgia; two in Winnipeg Canada and one near home in Delta British Columbia. Mr. Simonis often plays the piano; the piano always loses. |
Guy SnowdenCo-founder and former CEO of GTECH Corporation
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Guy Snowden was chosen for his success in co-developing on-line lotteries, as co-developer and CEO of the billion-dollar GTECH Corporation, and for helping to bring on-line games to lotteries around the world.
Drawing on his experience with real-time transactions processing systems gained from his employment at IBM, Guy Snowden became involved in the lottery industry during the pioneering years of the early 1970s. Guy recognized the relevance of these systems to the then popular “offline” lottery games of the times. Applying communications, printing, point-of-sale and game software technology to the emerging lottery industry, Guy helped start government-sponsored lotteries in five North American states while working with his future partner, Victor Markowicz. In 1976, Guy co-founded Gaming Dimensions Inc., a gaming software and design consultancy which merged with Datatrol – a leading supplier of on-line terminals and systems – to become the world’s leading supplier of on-line wagering networks. As Executive Vice President of Datatrol’s Gaming Systems Division, Guy help introduced the world’s first on-line lotto system for the Province of Ontario. In 1980, Guy and two other partners acquired the assets of the Gaming Systems Division from Datatrol and founded GTECH. As President of GTECH from 1980 to 1994, Guy managed the Company’s explosive growth and entry into the international marketplace. Chief Executive since the company’s inception, Guy was elected Chairman of the Board in 1987 and played a leadership role in the day-to-day management of GTECH responsible for strategy, broad policy and overseeing all operational matters. During the 70s and 80s, many state and foreign jurisdictions elected to operate lotteries as a means of providing funding for public projects. Under Guy’s leadership, GTECH Corporation designed, produced, and implemented over 80 computerized on-line lottery networks, as well as other transaction systems networks for governments around the world, maintaining and expanding the Company’s leadership of their worldwide markets. Ultimately Guy and his partner, Victor Markowicz, took GTECH (GTK: NYSE) and by 1998, GTECH had become the market leader with annual revenues of about $1B and more than 5,000 employees worldwide. A Snapshot of Guy Snowden Lottery Experience Grew GTECH, the world’s leading on-line lottery supplier, to a $1B global business; Capitalized the company, through 2 IPOs and 1 LBO, creating significant value for shareholders, customers and employees; Helped craft the games, security systems, implementations and governmental regulations that today continue to frame the global lottery marketplace; Led the GTECH teams which developed, implemented and marketed some of the world’s largest – and smallest lottery games – all with the public’s appreciation and trust; Mentored young professionals in the company and in the industry who continued on to become executives, consultants, analysts and technologists in the gaming and other industries; and led the growing global lottery industry -- with other supplier executives, lottery chiefs and government officials – to become a trusted source of worldwide revenue for good causes. |
Dr. Edward StanekFormer CEO of the Iowa Lottery Authority
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Ed Stanek was chosen for the Lottery Industry Hall of Fame for his leadership in co-founding the Multi-State Lottery Association, for co-designing Powerball, one of the most important lotto games in the world, for being the principal innovator among lottery leaders and for his international leadership in the lottery industry.
Edward J. Stanek was the first employee and has been the chief executive of the Iowa Lottery since its inception in 1985 and is the world’s second most senior lottery director. He is also the co-inventor of Powerball, one of the world’s most successful lotto games, and is a founder and past president of the Multi-State Lottery Association (MUSL) that man-ages and sells Powerball. He has served as the Chair of the MUSL Development Committee which reviews, researches, and develops new game and promotion concepts for the organization. Dr. Stanek is a past president of the North American Association of State and Provincial Lotteries (NASPL) and of the International Association of State Lotteries (AILE). He was on the Presidium of the International Association of Lotto and Toto Organizations (INTERTOTO) and past Senior Vice President of the World Lottery Association (WLA). Ed was the 1997 winner of the Peter J. O’Connell Lottery Lifetime Achievement Award and has appeared on the cover of Public Gaming International Magazine 6 times. Under his direction, the Iowa Lottery has become known for creativity and innovation. It was the first lottery to require electronic money transfers to and from all of its retailers (1985), the first to sell prepackaged multiple ticket ensembles (1986), the first to sell pulltab tickets (1987), the first to sell guaranteed winning tickets as greeting cards (1989), the first to use pull-tab vending machines (1991), the first in the US to design an extended play scratch game with a higher price point starting with Bingo (1992), the first to do an on-line game based on dates (1993), the first to use an automated electronic random drawing machine on television (1993), the first in the US to offer the CD-ROM enhanced game invented in Canada (2002), the first to do market research with surveys via its Internet web site (2001), the first to offer monitor vending machines (2002), and the first to deploy Electronic Game Cards (2004). Dr. Stanek was granted a US patent May 3, 2005 for a unified on-line lotto game that can transcend prize structures, time zones, and currency differences. He has a patent pending for a split matrix game that is a combination of lotto and keno. Dr. Stanek has a Ph.D. in physics from Iowa State Univer-sity, is on the board of directors of the Vintage Mutual Funds, and has authored three books on American decorative arts and antiques. |
Cal TignerFounder of Take-A-Ticket
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Cal Tigner revolutionized the sale of scratch-off lottery tickets by inventing the scratch-off ticket sales dispenser that displayed tickets so customers could see them. It also made practical the marketing of more games simultaneously.
Shortly after the Oregon Lottery began operations in 1985, I stopped at a small store in Harrisburg to buy a pop. As the cash register drawer opened for my change I noticed the lottery tickets in it. I asked the clerk for two of them and as she handed them to me I realized that if I hadn’t seen them I wouldn’t have bought them. That evening I made my first dispenser out of cardboard. It’s a beauty. The next evening I made my first plastic dispenser, another beauty. And the rest is history; except for all the hard work. I was sure that I had a winner, but starting Take-A-Ticket six months before I received my first Social Security check was a little scary. I told my son Calvin that if investing everything in a business this late in life hadn’t worked out then Estelle and I would have been living in our motor home in his driveway. I also thought that within three years I would have a dispenser selling one game in each store and TAT would probably be history. I had no idea that 20 years later the company would be stronger than ever. Starting out was difficult. I had a new unproven idea. I could build any house but had never fabricated plastics. I had no contacts in the lottery industry and everything was trial and error. My first big breakthrough was the first Public Gaming Conference I attended. Duane Burke took me under his wing and walked me around introducing me to the people I should know in the industry. The startup of Take-A-Ticket was made much easier with the help of the PGRI and the Burkes. I was lucky to have good friends to help me with my idea. |
Lorne WeilChairman and Chief Executive Officer, Hydra Management, LLC
Country: USA |
REASON FOR INDUCTION: Lorne Weil is being recognized for his part in implementing on-line technology to the lottery industry and for his leadership in the growth and success of the lottery industry worldwide.
Lorne Weil began his lottery career with General Instrument in the late 70’s. As VP of Corporate Development he was part of the management team that designed, developed and launched the first online lottery systems in North America in New Jersey and Maryland. In the eighties Mr. Weil acquired a major equity stake in the company formerly known as Autotote. By the mid nineties Autotote had become the world leader in pari-mutuel systems and had succeeded in diversifying into the online lottery business by virtue of several pioneering technology developments- the first PC based terminal, the first use of IP-based networks, the first open system, the first “ticket in ticket out” VLT terminal and system. In 2000 Autotote acquired Scientific Games, choosing to keep the latter’s name, and Mr. Weil continued as Chairman and Chief Executive. Between 2000 and the present Scientific Games acquired MDI Entertainment, IGT/OES, the Serchi Company in Chile, and the Honsel Company in Germany. Along the way it became far and away the world leader in instant tickets, the leader in licensed properties, and one of two leaders in the online business. |