World's Premier Lottery Company Experiences No Service Interruption
WEST GREENWICH, R.I., Jan. 4 /PRNewswire/ -- GTECH Corporation (NYSE: GTK)
today announced that Y2K-related issues did not adversely impact its global
lottery operations. GTECH's lottery customers, located across the world in 13
different time zones, were supported by more than 700 GTECH employees during
the 60-hour transition period into the new millennium.
( Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/19990728/GTKOCONNOR )
"GTECH plays a critical role that enables government authorized lotteries
around the world to securely sell lottery tickets and generate much needed
non-tax revenue for good causes," said William Y. O'Connor, GTECH's Chairman
and CEO. "Y2K presented a formidable challenge for our customers and our
company, one that I'm delighted to say we were able to overcome without any
incidents or downtime."
The Company began its Y2K remediation program in 1997. Since that time,
GTECH spent in excess of $20 million and devoted more than 200,000 person
hours to ensure that Y2K did not interrupt service. The project, the largest
in the Company's history, involved managing not only GTECH's own systems, but
also numerous other lottery and third-party systems, as well as
telecommunications networks in 37 different countries. GTECH's investment and
focus paid off.
New Zealand's National Lottery was the GTECH's first lottery customer to
cross over into the New Year at 6:00 am (EST) on December 31, 1999. Twenty-
one hours later, GTECH lottery customers on the west coast of the United
States followed, all without incident.
During GTECH's last fiscal year, the Company's systems securely processed
some 40 billion transactions over its dedicated networks; more transactions
than Visa(R) and MasterCard(R) processed combined. GTECH's lottery customers
raised more than $20 billion in revenue from lottery ticket sales, funds that
were used to by governments to support a variety of good causes. Each week,
an estimated 163 million people play their lottery on systems provided and
supported by GTECH.
GTECH has operations in 36 countries on six continents and is the on-line
lottery technology provider to 28 of 38 government-authorized lotteries in the
United States. All told, two thirds of the world's automated government-
authorized lotteries have selected GTECH to be their on-line lottery
technology and service provider.
SOURCE GTECH
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Related links:
http://www.gtech.com
Photo Notes:http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/19990728/GTKOCONNOR
PR Newswire Photo Desk, 888-776-6555 or 201-369-3467
CONTACT:
Robert Rendine, Vice President, Corporate
Communications of GTECH, 401-392-7452
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