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YGAM and GamCare go digital to deliver world class education programme despite Covid-19

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Leading charities YGAM (The Young Gamers and Gamblers Education Trust) and GamCare have risen to the challenges caused by the Covid-19 pandemic by accelerating the digital transformation of their education resources and using virtual classrooms to raise awareness of gambling related harms. The two organisations, which were selected by the Betting and Gaming Council to deliver its £10 million funded national education programme, have succeeded in delivering over 20 classes reaching out to 350 individuals since April.

Explaining the challenges, Kev Clelland, Operations Director at YGAM, said: “The Covid-19 pandemic has dramatically changed both personal and work life. The charity sector in particular has faced profound challenges impacting both funding and how organisations are able to reach the people they have the responsibility to support.

“During lockdown the YGAM Practitioner Workshops have been presented as a blended digital offering which is proving hugely popular with both teachers and other professionals. Our education team has trained over 300 practitioners online, significantly more than the number we had planned to train face-to-face. Such has been the success that YGAM is now building up to deliver a minimum of five blended digital Practitioner Workshops a week.”
He continued: “We have added to our education team during lockdown and also written a raft of new resources, including full schemes from year 3 to year 11 as well as youth work specific materials. We have also formed groups to look at how we best approach our work in Wales and Northern Ireland.”

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YGAM has also launched its new ‘Parent Hub’ website dedicated to providing an abundance of important resources and activities to support families and help build digital resilience. Through the summer, the ‘Parent Hub’ will be developed further courtesy of additional video content, podcasts, and social media campaigns. With university courses expected to be facilitated online in some form for the remainder of 2020, YGAM is focused on adapting its student resources ready for the upcoming first semester.

GamCare workshops for young people and CPD accredited training sessions for professionals have been moved online, with the result that attendance has doubled from April to May with new eLearning modules in development. A brand-new delivery team has been on-boarded in order to scale up the programme both online and face-to-face when it is safe to do so.

Downloadable factsheets are available for parents and teachers who would like to introduce the topic to young people via www.bigdeal.org.uk, GamCare’s dedicated website for young people, parents and teachers, and a new working group has been convened to ensure that the team can continue to reach young people despite reduced contact and social distancing, including via YouTube.

For more information on the Betting and Gaming Council’s Safer Gambling Commitments: https://bettingandgamingcouncil.com/safer-gambling/

 

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Leadership transition within the Merkur Group

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Paul Gauselmann steps down from the group’s executive management / Michael Gauselmann assumes the roles of Chairman of the Supervisory Board and the Board of Directors of the Gauselmann Family Foundation / Lars Felderhoff is appointed new Chairman of the Management Board

A new chapter is dawning for the Merkur Group as company founder Paul Gauselmann is set to retire as Management Board Chairman on 1 October, stepping back from the company’s executive leadership. For 67 years, he has shaped the destiny of the group, transforming a part-time one-man business into an internationally acclaimed group of companies with total sales revenues of around 4 billion euros and external sales revenues of over 2.7 billion euros. “I have consistently devoted my energy to the company’s welfare, and at the same time to the benefit of our approximately 15,000 employees,” he stated. “Now the time has come to entrust my life’s work to the younger generation,” explains Paul Gauselmann. Lars Felderhoff, 48, CFO of the Merkur Group, will assume the role of Chairman. He will be supported by JĂŒrgen StĂŒhmeyer (64), Management Board member with responsibility for sales, and Manfred Stoffers (70), Management Board member with responsibility for marketing, communications and political affairs, as vice-chairs. “I am delighted that this trio is taking over the helm. They are outstanding leaders with a deep understanding of the company,” adds Paul Gauselmann, who will continue his association with the company as a member of the Gauselmann Family Foundation.

A generational shift is also taking place on another level: Michael Gauselmann (68) is set to assume the role of Chairman of the Supervisory Board from Manfred GrĂŒnewald (89) on 1 October. He will also succeed Paul Gauselmann as Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Gauselmann Family Foundation. As the sole shareholder of the group, the Foundation is the hub for all fundamental strategic decisions. “I am thrilled that my son Michael is embracing this important responsibility and will contribute his international experience to our company,” states Paul Gauselmann. Michael Gauselmann, a business administration graduate, joined the group in 1982 and worked across all business segments. He advanced internationalisation by establishing the subsidiary Atronic in 1993, overseeing all foreign operations. For a decade, he served as Vice-Chairman of the Management Board before becoming Co-Chairman of the Group Management Board, sharing responsibilities with Paul Gauselmann from 2004 to 2012. From 2013, he was involved in the then Gauselmann Family Council and, from 2016, in the Gauselmann Family Foundation.

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Lars Felderhoff will assume responsibility for executive management as the new Group Chairman. He has overseen the finances and organisation of the Merkur Group since 2018. He started his career in 2000 at the subsidiary Atronic. From 2007 to 2011, he expanded his expertise at the gaming group GTech (now IGT) and at Metro Cash & Carry International, a wholesale group. Felderhoff rejoined Merkur in 2011 as the Commercial Director of the adp Merkur subsidiary. In that capacity, he was in charge of commercial operations for the Merkur business segment, encompassing over 40 companies both in Germany and internationally. As a native of Rahden, he has close ties to the region and understands the roots of the corporate group. “The challenge is immense, and naturally, we will not be able to fill the shoes of an entrepreneur like Paul Gauselmann one-to-one. However, the company is robust and agile enough to continue setting new benchmarks in the future.”

He is assisted by the Management Board’s Vice-Chairs, JĂŒrgen StĂŒhmeyer and Manfred Stoffers. StĂŒhmeyer, who hails from Minden, has dedicated 37 years to the Eastern-Westphalian company, starting as a trainee in 1987 and progressively advancing through the ranks. In his function as the Management Board member responsible for sales, he has directed the strategic orientation and commercial success of the entire Merkur pillar since 2007. Manfred Stoffers joined the company in 2011 as a consultant to the Chairman of Gauselmann AG, and was appointed Management Board member responsible for Marketing, Communications and Political Affairs in 2015.

Paul Gauselmann expressed great satisfaction with the top-level personnel changes, stating, “Reorganising the company by the time I turn 90 has been my wish for some time. We have accomplished this very well and are ideally positioned for the future, particularly as my son Michael, both a member of the Gauselmann family and an experienced entrepreneur, will continue to be involved in the most critical decisions.”

The post Leadership transition within the Merkur Group appeared first on European Gaming Industry News.

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QTech Games partners with SmartSoft Gaming to strengthen its varied offering

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Leading distributor teams up with non-traditional specialist to underscore its status as a definitive one-stop-shop for igaming

QTech Games, the leading game distributor for emerging markets, has launched with innovative games developer SmartSoft Gaming in a new deal for the platform which adds more muscle to its definitive product portfolio, allowing its clients to access another multifaceted catalogue.

Founded in Georgia in 2015, SmartSoft Gaming has swiftly cemented its reputation as a unique igaming software studio by creating many sought-after games, as well as delivering top-quality promotional tools with which to acquire new players and deepen players’ engagement in responsible fashion.

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SmartSoft is proven across a number of verticals including slots, keno and roulette, alongside a category of crash titles, known as XGames, whose flagship creation is the hugely popular JetX. SmartSoft’s games are designed with immersive narratives, eye-catching design and high-class gamification components.

The developer’s offering features a rich variety of other dynamic games and slots, as well as virtual casino content. It represents just the latest studio to benefit from QTech Games’ unrivalled speed-to-market and the machine-learning excellence of its AI games lobby, which curates targeted portfolios of games for operators across Asia, LatAm, Africa and the CIS-facing markets.

The ascendant crash-games domain continues to go from strength to strength with a truly global fanbase, particularly in breakout territories like LatAm and Africa, where SmartSoft’s innovative and authentic gameplay have placed its premium content, like JetX, in the vanguard of this must-have igaming vertical. Accordingly, these games now all form part of the progressive portfolio made available to QTech Games, its partners and their culturally-diverse appetites of their myriad players.

Accordingly, integrating this content from one of the most innovative and creative online casino game developers adds more muscle to QTech Games’ thriving platform, which is bringing the widest range of online games to emerging territories with established names, such as Evolution and Yggdrasil, sitting alongside the sector’s rising-star providers.

As the fastest-growing distributor in Asia and other growth markets, QTech’s platform boasts the broadest gaming portfolio around, localised for each region, with native mobile apps, powerful reporting and marketing tools, and 24/7 local-language support.

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Philip Doftvik, CEO at QTech Games, said: “We’re pleased to have signed another progressive agreement with a brand like SmartSoft Gaming, whose games need little introduction and are routinely raising the bar for cutting-edge mobile and web gaming.

“SmartSoft produces a range of innovative and interesting titles across a range of gaming verticals, including the in-demand crash format, so it’s fantastic to be able to bring these compelling titles to the QTech Games platform. We firmly believe these games will resonate strongly with our operator partners’ customers around the world and are thrilled to bring SmartSoft aboard.”

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Discover ancient plagues and big wins in Shadow Summoner Egypt

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Would you dare to summon the most terrifying of Egyptian plagues? That is exactly what’s being asked of players in Fantasma Games’ latest blockbuster slot, Shadow Summoner Egypt, already showing outstanding player engagement KPIs from its initial limited market release. Shadow Summoner Egypt is scheduled for general market release in the very near future.

Players must travel along the Shadow Summoner to unlock the Tomes of Locusts, Blood, Sacrifice and Firestorm if they are to find the wonderful treasures that can be discovered in the ruin and destruction these tomes bring to the reels.

And what are these treasures? The Tome of Firestorm turns itself into a Multiplier and destroys 4-12 random symbols. For each symbol destroyed, the Multiplier increases by 1x.

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The Tome of Locusts brings an explosion to the reels, turning itself and all neighbouring paying symbols into the same random paying symbol. Meanwhile, the Tome of Blood turns 1-4 neighbouring symbols and itself Wild for even more win possibilities.

The Tome of Sacrifice wields great power and can bring one of four upgrades to the reels. This includes turning all of the low symbols into their corresponding high symbols before the Tome of Sacrifice itself becomes the corresponding high symbol of the last upgrade.

But that’s not all. Sometimes the Tomes of Blood, Locusts and Sacrifices will turn into a Multiplier after activation. That’s not the only time Multipliers can appear – they can drop at any point during the game and range from 2x to 100x.

The darkness of the plagues is followed by the brightness of the sun. Sun Free Spins see players receive four spins initially with a guaranteed Tome in play. If enough winning symbols are collected during the initial spins, another four are retriggered.

The total win Multiplier is semi-persistent and is applied to the win if there is a Multiplier on the reels at the end of a winning spin.

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Then there are the Moon Free Spins where all Tomes can land. If a further four bonus symbols drop, players receive an additional 10 Moon Free Spins. Again, there is a semi-persistent Multiplier in play.

Fredrik Johansson, CEO and Founder at Fantasma Games, said: “Shadow Summoner Egypt is the latest in our Shadow Summer series.  Players must be bold and brave, summoning plagues and tomes if they are to discover the exciting and thrilling treasures they contain.

“Shadow Summoner Egypt really showcases the excellence of our games, combining a great theme with striking design, a compelling narrative and gameplay that promises to put players on the edge of their seats spin after spin.

“This is a solid addition to our portfolio of premium online slot games and we look forward to seeing players travel along the Shadow Summoner in their quest for potentially big wins”.

The post Discover ancient plagues and big wins in Shadow Summoner Egypt appeared first on European Gaming Industry News.

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