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EELEX Review - What a Show!3 February 2004EELEX 2003 was a surprise we all should have expected, one of the first comments received was, "the show is as big as ICE," from Gerhard Burda of Atronic International. Well it was, in fact many thought this show was bigger with many two story booths. The presentation too was much more professional and confident. Congratulations to Boris Belotsokovsky and all his team at Unicum who organized the show. The only major drawback is still getting into the show and using very young and inexperienced/untrained staff to process registration and badges caused unacceptable delays. Most exhibitors were previous show supporters with some new ones. All previous exhibitors had increased booth sizes, for example AGS, Unicum & WMS. However, due to mergers or joint ventures some companies had combined resources, the best example of this was TCSJohn Huxley who announced a joint venture with Octavian Inter-national. Their distribution arm Casino Amusement Technology Supplies (CATS) are responsible for all distribution in the Russian Federation and other Eastern European countries. Dutch manufacturer Twice a Company also had a presence on this booth. UNICUM had a huge area to house the products from companies they represent in Russia like Atronic International, Ainsworth Gaming Technology and Bally Gaming. An interesting development was that Unicum are now also manufacturing their own brand slot machines for the Russian market. In discussions with the major manufacturers as to whether this indicated a conflict of interest on the part of Unicum, the general response was very cool and positive along the lines that in terms of slot machines Unicum was a one stop shop with leading brand choices, together with their excellent distribution network and maintenance record, it was a win-win situation all round. |