MGM to launch social gaming site
CEO Jim Murren describes Las Vegas-style site as "strong customer acquisition and brand extension tool".
United States-facing casino operator MGM will soon roll out a social gaming site exclusively featuring its brands, chief executive Jim Murren revealed in an investor call following the company’s first-quarter results.
According to Murren the site is intended to “recreate the Las Vegas Strip experience” and will exclusively feature MGM brands.
The CEO hopes the new development “will be superior to what you currently see in the market and will be a strong customer acquisition and brand extension tool for us.”
Murren also said that the operator remains “aggressively focused on pursuing federal legislation for online poker,” adding that MGM is “Keenly aware of what’s going on, on a state-by-state basis for those opportunities, which we think will likely emerge.” He had earlier revealed that he believed federal egaming regulation would happen in the US before the end of the year.
Ahead of potential regulation in the United States, MGM entered into a joint venture last year with bwin.party with an online poker focus. As part of the deal MGM is expected to sit on a US-facing network from the London-listed egaming operator once regulation allows.
At this stage it is unclear whether any of bwin.party’s brands, which include PartyPoker, bwin and the World Poker Tour, would have any presence on MGM’s planned social site. The World Poker Tour brand is already active on Facebook via an app developed by Hands-On Entertainment which boasts 170,000 monthly active users.
MGM’s first-quarter results saw the company’s net revenues increase by 51% year-on-year, excluding MGM China, with casino revenues more than doubling to US$1.33m compared to $590,000 in Q1 2011. However the company’s net loss more than doubled year-on-year, coming in at $217,253 for the three months ended 31 March.