Casino Enterprise Management

If you ask PokerTek CEO Lou White how he feels about stone-hearted skeptics, he’ll answer, “When they tell you your idea won’t work, don’t believe them.”

White and PokerTek President, James Crawford, make it a point to ignore the disbeliever. In fact, it’s safe to say this entrepreneurial dynamic duo is the antithesis of the many wandering dreamers of this world.

And walking away from the naysayer has never proven so sweet.

As assets churn into many millions over, PokerTek sees a staggering amount of interest in its PokerPro® automated poker games. For instance, Carnival cruise lines recently signed a three-year contract with PokerTek to place PokerPro systems in many of its luxury liners. To that end, the PokerPro line can be found at casinos throughout North America, including Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino and Hollywood Park Casino.

That’s not all. Aided by a strategic partnership with Aristocrat, PokerTek has gone transcontinental, with tables in casinos at Aspers UK, Ladbrokes UK, Carnival City Casino, South Africa and Crown Casino Melbourne, Australia—which just happens to host the Aussie Millions tournament.

And the interest in automated poker tables keeps on growing.

Two Soccer Dads, One Vision

White and Crawford began a long-term friendship through participation in their daughters’ soccer team association. White, who retired from Dell Corp. in 2001 as an account executive for the company’s large enterprise account acquisitions, knew he wanted to start his own business venture, but he also knew it was imperative that he stay in sales.

It didn’t take long for White to make a connection between his love of a good sell and a newfound fascination with poker. “I never played poker before,” he said. “And when I saw it on T.V., I loved the strategic aspect of the game. I went to a casino and played it and was just absolutely sold.”

Crawford added: “While technology in casinos is not a new idea, bringing technology into the poker room was revolutionary, and PokerTek was the innovator. With vision and creativity like this, PokerPro was destined for success.”

“We took it to the next level and developed unique and novel features that brought it all together into one product. And we ran with it,” Crawford said.

The goal was to create a product for the rapidly growing demographic of poker players; one that would increase game pace, decrease the risk of dealer error, and ultimately satisfy the casino’s—as well as the player’s—pocketbook.

“It was clear to us at the time that poker was on the cusp of a huge wave of growth,” White said.
White and Crawford worked for about five months creating a rudimentary prototype accurate enough to outline proper demonstration to potential players and operators.

“We told ourselves at that point ‘this is something that the poker players are going to gravitate toward because it is so much faster and eliminates mistakes or other problems that come with a manual poker table. Poker is a very complicated game,” White said.

“So, we decided to go ahead with automated poker tables. We wanted to prove to ourselves that we could sit down as poker players and play poker at an automated table, and that it was the real deal: It did play like poker and was fun.”

Crawford intimated that receiving advice from people who live and breathe poker, like Lyle Berman from World Poker Tour, certainly enhanced the construction of the first PokerPro table. Through a series of meetings with Berman and others, White and Crawford developed their ideas around what they learned.

In those meetings, Crawford added, “our business—the electronic poker table—was born like an epiphany.”

Then, on May 24, 2005, PokerTek dealt its first hand of automated poker at Seminole Hard Rock in Hollywood, Fla., and a new generation of automated table games (and loyal poker followers) was born.

The PokerPro Suite

Since May 2005, PokerTek has grown consistently, become publicly traded, and now employs 67 people. This crew has its work cut out for them as they create, design, assemble, market, and sell the PokerPro Suite to eligible casinos and other venues throughout the world.

The classic PokerPro system is a ten-seated automated table that deals more than 50 percent faster than a human dealer while eliminating the risk of dealer error and player dishonesty. According to White, who says the system changes the fundamental economics of playing poker, PokerPro is more exciting because of its rapid pace.

Likewise, White said, the PokerPro line is a perfect gateway into a “brick and mortar” casino establishment for a perpetually isolated online demographic. 

“PokerPro takes everything that is great about playing poker online: It’s fast, and there are no mistakes; but, playing online is not very social,” White said. “Poker is a social game by definition, so it takes the best of brick and mortar, which is, you are out with other human beings, you’re in a casino environment which is fun and exciting, and you get all the benefits of the technology that you would with Internet poker.”

Since poker promotes such a social atmosphere, White said, PokerTek took the PokerPro system one step further and created the PokerPro Heads-Up™, which owns the speed, accuracy, and safety of the classic PokerPro system, but takes up half the room and provides an even faster, more intricate game structure, one that will appeal to online Heads-Up players. 

“It’s a really fun way to play poker. It’s very skill-based and looking at what players are playing online is an indication of what they want to do. Heads Up has become very popular online…it allows the operator to offer a fun, new, and exciting game type for their players and they do it in a very economical way,” White said.

As peripheral add-ons to existing PokerPro equipment, PokerTek offers operators an automated waiting list. The kiosk system was created to eliminate the hustle and bustle of the often confusing waiting list found in most pits.

“I love the game, and I get an opportunity to play in a lot of rooms,” White exclaimed. “The process of getting into a room, getting on a list, and getting set up at the appropriate seat is sometimes problematic for the customer, and it takes a lot of people to accomplish that for the casino.”

He said once a player signs up for a card, he can swipe it to enter whichever game he wants to play once the waiting list calls his name. When he finds the appropriate table reserved for him, the touch screen displays the name of the player and he can go sit down.

The system not only creates comfort and ease of play, but the operator benefits as well. With the system, White added, operators “have the technology, they have access to lots of reports and data that allow them to see who’s playing, when they’re playing, what they’re playing—many of the things the slot departments have benefited for years, which is to have a detailed player tracking—we now have that for poker management.”

Reputation

Though goals and dreams at PokerTek are high, it seems the team is ready for the challenge. And with all the positive reception the PokerPro line has received thus far, it looks as though there will only be more significant growth in the future.

Part of that growth, according to Crawford, has to do with the ever-increasing population of poker players who embrace the technological advantages that make play so much more satisfying.
 “Amateurs and experienced players like PokerPro because it’s all about playing poker. A lot of people like PokerPro because you can’t bet out of turn or accidentally muck your cards,” Crawford said. “I think experienced players like it because there’s no way you can break the rules.”

White said the PokerPro automated table games are an excellent fit for venues that traditionally could not host poker due to logistical constraints, like cruise ships. All that has changed since PokerPro continues to add the line to numerous Carnival cruise ships in varying ports and destinations.

“Poker typically wasn’t offered on most cruise ships because of the labor intensity to it; having to have dealers on the ship all the time is very problematic,” White said. “But more and more players wanted to play as part of their overall cruise experience.”

Paul Jarvis, director of Casino Operations for Carnival Corporation, said that PokerPro appeals to all levels of playing skill and the addition of the tables have been enormously popular. “The PokerPro automated poker tables have been well received by our guests, as they appeal to both novices and experienced players alike,” he said.

Jarvis added that Carnival guests like the pace and security PokerPro offers. “Guests who are new to Hold’Em appreciate the fact that the table prevents them from making simple errors like betting out of turn, while the experienced players appreciate the increased speed of the game,” he said. “The touch screen controls are intuitive and the game play is identical to a ‘live’ Hold’Em table, except for the absence of dealer/player errors and the replacement of a physical shuffle with an electronic shuffle.”

Aside from rapidly gaining popularity among cruise ship passengers, PokerPro gains in areas where poker is traditionally prohibited. For jurisdictions that normally were prevented from offering poker because of a state’s regulatory structure, the PokerPro system presents the opportunity to change all that. For example, in the growing racino markets it’s not uncommon to have state laws that prohibit human dealers. PokerPro allows operators to offer poker and still comply with state gaming regulations.

To that end, the executives at PokerTek know the power of a good poker game, and consistently bet on the fact that PokerPro will entice players around the world. Overall, Crawford added, “If you’re playing poker to make money, you cannot afford not to play PokerPro. It just plays that much faster.”

Likewise, World Poker Tour’s Lyle Berman, chair of the Pokertek board, said the PokerPro system will revolutionize the world of poker. “We liken our machine to the slot machine. You used to put in money, pull a handle, and receive tokens; now you touch a screen get a paper slip…. The PokerPro system has really been instrumental in reducing costs to the operator and making the game really fun for players.”

Berman also predicted that most—if not all—poker rooms will use automated tables within the next five years.

The Team

But the story of PokerPro isn’t a simple creation myth built on the mighty strength of two men alone. For them, PokerTek wouldn’t be PokerTek without a few of the right people.
“James and I had an opportunity to build a company that we wanted to work at. And so, I think we’ve done a really good job bringing on the sort of people that we have here,” White said.
Running largely as an entrepreneurial entity, PokerTek has overcome start-up phase and aggressively moved into a larger competing market, one that relies heavily on knowledge of the global business environment.

“Very early on, Lou and I both looked at each other and said, ‘The people we want to hire for this company at the very least have to be as smart, if not smarter, than we are,’” Crawford said.

So White and Crawford hired the elite in their distinguished fields. “As time goes by, the stability, viability, and robustness of our product will prove we made the right decisions in the people that we hired,” White said.

With a strategic partnership with Aristocrat, which has full access to PokerPro’s global business, White and Crawford are confident that global growth will reach unprecedented highs. “We already see it now. Bringing a brand new product and concept to market is a tough thing to do,” Crawford added. “But to make that product work and to be robust and withstand the test of time is something that’s added on top of that.”

Rounding up the right people has been humbling, according to Crawford, who said, “The funny thing I tell people who come and ask me what I think about working for PokerTek is I always thought I was a pretty smart guy, until I worked for PokerTek.”

Growth and Goals

As for market growth in the upcoming year, Crawford and White believe there’s epic potential, especially in the cruise ship arena and newly licensed international venues. Crawford remarked that the popularity of automated poker on cruise ships reflects the growing interest in PokerTek’s products. “If you go on a cruise, especially in the Caribbean and you want to play poker, chances are PokerPro is your choice. Consequently, there’s no resistance, people line up to play, and some ships already have multiple tables. Plus, when people leave the cruise, they seek out PokerPro at their local casino.”

White said future goals also include a dramatic layering of other products onto the existing PokerPro line-up, one which includes a multi-table tournament style automated table system that will prove to be an enormous hit for tournament lovers across the globe.

“We’re using technology to allow you to run multi-table tournaments with different denominations at different times—exciting for the players, very efficient for the operators,” White said.

Next up for PokerTek is a new Omaha game, an alternative form of traditional poker that is very slow to deal. For instance, while a Hold‘Em table deals 25 to 27 hands per hour, Omaha deals 12-18, thus slowing down game pace.

“Omaha is a complicated game to deal to because each player must use two cards of the four hole cards,” Crawford said. “Often, determining the winning hand is time consuming and challenging for a dealer because in a typical game, a high hand splits the pot with a qualifying low hand. PokerPro not only speeds up the game, it also eliminates any mistakes and this is advantageous to both players and operators.”

Along with Omaha and multi-table tournament systems, White and Crawford want PokerTek to continue exploring ways to promote player adoption of classic PokerPro and the newer Heads-Up systems.

“A lot of times people see new technology and if they’re not driven to it, people will do what they know. And it’s not because they wouldn’t prefer one thing over another, it’s just that they’re creatures of habit and often shy away from unfamiliar technology,” Crawford said.
When asked whether or not PokerTek will expand outside of the poker pit, White said it’s important for the company to stay focused on existing markets.

“We’re not asking ourselves what can we do to bring PokerPro technology into the main casino, we’re saying, now that we have this technology in the poker room, what can we do to bring more variation and enticing traditional casino style games inside the poker room? Our goal is to make the experience for the player more fun, enjoyable, and exciting while increasing profit for the operator.” White said.

The Future at Hand

It looks as though PokerTek will see a phenomenal future filled with lucrative deals, absolute success, and maybe some more time for those soccer association meetings. As White and Crawford seem to put it, success is all in the game.

 “Take some action. Don’t just think about your ideas—act on them,” White said.
Because PokerTek instinctively followed one huge vision—which just happened to be the creation of a flawless automated poker table—and because they moved forward quickly, took action without the reluctance that keep others perpetually doodling their way through business plans in the middle of the night, White and Crawford are quickly redefining the game of poker and what it means to play the game.

“The most important thing for me was to seek advice from experts. Bringing a new product to the gaming industry takes a lot of work and a lot of resources,” Crawford said. “Before we started building, we set out to learn from everyone in the business. We interviewed casino operators, dealers, players, vendors and professionals. Anyone we could find with the right experience became our sounding board. And it really enhanced our product. There’s no substitute for that
experience.”