BMM Testlabs brings thought leadership to gaming industry events

BMM Testlabs is pleased to announce sponsorship and participation in two upcoming, prominent industry events – The East Coast Gaming Congress to be held at the Borgata this week and the IAGA Gaming Summit, to be held in Canada in June. BMM is a sponsor of the East Coast Gaming Congress where Travis Foley, Executive Vice President Operations for BMM Americas, will be joining the BMM panel: ‘The Next Generation of Gambling’ on Thursday May 28th. The panel will be moderated by William J. Pascrell, III, Partner, Princeton Public Affairs Group. Other panel members include: David Chang, Chief Marketing Officer, Gamblit Gaming; Jeff Connors, President, Traffic Generation Limited; Kurt Freedlund, President, Lotto Interactive; and Peter Yesawich, Vice Chairman, MMGY Global. Travis Foley has over 15 years gaming industry experience, with 13 of those spent at the Nevada Gaming Control Board’s Technology Division, where he was involved in the creation of regulations and standards for new technologies. Currently overseeing BMM’s operations in North and South America, Foley is clearly an expert in the field. He comments, “It’s very important for BMM to be able to share our knowledge and expertise with the industry. We are a long-time supporter of the East Coast Gaming Congress, now in its nineteenth year and I look forward to an interesting few days at the Borgata. I also look forward to the prestigious IAGA Gaming Summit, where I will be joining a panel to discuss recent market changes.” On Friday, June 5th at the IAGA Gaming Summit, Connie Jones from AGEM will moderate the panel ‘When Opportunity Knocks: Responding to Market Changes’. Foley will be joined by Duarte Chagas, Legal Advisor, Macau DICJ; Senator Mark Lipparelli, Nevada State Senate; and Todd Haushalter, Vice President of Casino Operations, MGM Resorts...

BMM Testlabs Announces Traci Rushakoff as new Financial Controller

BMM Testlabs is pleased to announce Traci Rushakoff as Financial Controller. Based at BMM’s Las Vegas Headquarters, Rushakoff will assume responsibility for financial controls in North and South America and Canada, reporting to BMM’s Senior Executive Group. Rushakoff comes to BMM with twenty-plus years of professional experience, most recently working as Vice President/Director of Operations for a Las Vegas manufacturing and distribution company. Rushakoff has also held Financial Analyst, Controller and Senior Controller positions during her extensive career and holds a BBA of Accounting from the University of Montevallo, Alabama. Martin Storm, BMM’s Global President and CEO stated, “We are very pleased to welcome Traci Rushakoff to BMM. As the company continues to increase market share across the world we are constantly striving to make improvements to our services, our delivery and our team of experts. Traci’s financial background and diligent work ethic are second to none, and she will make an excellent addition to BMM’s Senior Management Group.” Rushakoff, a long-time Las Vegas resident, commented “I am very pleased to be joining BMM at this crucial point of company growth across the world, and specifically in the US. I look forward to being an integral part of the team and working closely with all of BMM’s clients and suppliers in the near...

By June Light, Director, Mathematics What makes a good Random Number Generator? Random Number Generators (RNG s) are one of the core pieces of every game. Their implementation into a gaming application is the difficult part. There are two types of RNGs: physical and software based RNGs. Physical or “True” RNGs achieve their randomness from unpredictable environmental properties such as white noise, the photoelectric effect, radioactive decay, or from a simple ball blower. Software RNGs are also called Pseudorandom RNGs (PRNGs) because they utilize an algorithm to generate a sequence of numbers whose properties closely mirror the properties of random number sequences. The pros and cons of each option must be considered when determining which is the right choice for its intended application. A good RNG is unpredictable and provides statistically independent outcomes that conform to a proper random distribution. Using physical RNGs in an application will provide statistically random outcomes if the application they are used in doesn’t need a plethora of outcomes quickly. Electronic games utilize RNG outcomes too quickly for physical RNGs to be a viable option. PRNGs are used extensively in electronic games for this reason. There are many known good PRNGs that are free such as KISS, Mersenne Twister, Fast MT, WELL, and Knuth. Many jurisdictions that allow online gaming require cryptographically strong RNGs. The Java class SecureRandom(), the urandom() file in linux, and Mircosoft’s RNGCryptoServiceProvider class are considered cryptographically strong RNGs. Like with “True” RNGs these cannot produce RNG outcomes fast enough for typical gaming applications. Cryptographically strong RNGs can be created from known good PRNGs by adding functionality to meet the online requirements. When implementing a PRNG into a gaming application there are a few things to keep in mind: The RNG should be “Thread Safe” Only one instance of the RNG is used for game results Scaling the RNG without introducing a bias Cycling the RNG in the background Seeding the RNG using an uncontrollable event The overall implementation of the PRNG should be kept thread safe. The algorithm could be violated if two (2) threads of code call the PRNG simultaneously. The consequences of violating the PRNG are difficult to predict. The PRNG could jump to another part of its cycle which could short cycle the RNG and reduce the number of possible outcomes to an unacceptable level. The PRNG could return the same outcome for both calls and if they are to be used for game results that could award a player too much or too little of prize skewing the overall RTP of the game. The PRNG could be corrupted and unable to recover. Maintaining the PRNG in a thread safe manner will keep the RNG operating as intended. Using multiple PRNGs for game results can affect the overall randomness of the application. More is not always better. Using one PRNG for game outcomes allows all the overall application to conform to a proper random distribution. The PRNG can also be used for random graphics and sounds as long as the period of the PRNG is large enough. For example, the period of a Mersenne Twister is 219937-1. Most gaming technical requirements necessitate the RNG be scaled without a bias. Unmodified PRNGs outcomes are typically in the range of 0-232-1 which requires the outcomes to be scaled down to the range of reel strip lengths, number of bingo balls, the total weights used in many bonus games, etc. If the PRNG outcome is not reduced properly the implementation will produce more small or high valued outcomes. A good scaling method will: Remove the natural decimal point feature of...

BMM Testlabs announces contract award from Indiana Gaming Commission

BMM Testlabs announced today that it has been awarded a contract to provide gaming laboratory testing services for the Indiana Gaming Commission (IGC). Travis Foley, EVP Operations – BMM Americas, commented, “We are very pleased to confirm that BMM has been awarded a contract with the Indiana Gaming Commission and would like to thank Executive Director, Ernest Yelton; General Counsel, Sara Gonso Tait; and IGC staff for their diligence throughout the RFP process.” Foley adds “BMM is honored to be able to provide independent testing services to the IGC in a competitive multi-laboratory environment. Multiple independent laboratories, while working together, can ensure a higher quality of testing services, competitive pricing, add transparency and enable more timely delivery of competitive products to the market place. BMM is looking forward to providing the highest quality testing services to the Indiana...

BMM Testlabs announces record 2014 financial results

BMM Testlabs is pleased to announce record financial results for 2014. “BMM’s commitment to service differentiation and innovation in product testing and certification has driven improved share in key markets around the world, with material growth emanating from the USA, Canada, Europe and Asia.” reported President and CEO Martin Storm. Storm continued, “Even with material currency declines against the US dollar, revenues increased by 6% driving overall record financial performance for our business as a whole. Prudent financial management led to growth in EBITDA by 17% and Cash by 11%.” “Beyond our financial goals we achieved significant operational performance milestones. We grew our specialist quality assurance testing business to over 50 engineers whilst reducing our U.S. testing revocations quality measure to less than 1%. We also increased our U.S. jurisdictional access significantly, expanded testing facilities in Las Vegas and Moncton, and opened new labs in Vienna and Bologna. Importantly we delivered major version releases of our Toolbox, BOAT and Signatures software for our customers.” “After more than 12 years of effort BMM is now poised for significant growth in the USA. I wish to thank our regulators, customers and staff for their patience, consideration, and...

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BMM Testlabs brings thought leadership to gaming industry events