Tracey Chernay: “By working smarter and using technology tools, we found ourselves stronger than ever”

Tracey Chernay, Senior Vice President, Global Casino, Gaming and Lottery at TransAct Technologies, granted an exclusive interview to Focus Gaming News to talk about highlights of 2021 and challenges for next year.

Exclusive interview.- Tracey Chernay from TransAct Technologies shared her impressions about the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic in the industry, the company main highlights for 2021 and future projects for 2022.

Which was the highlight of 2021 for TransAct?

Undoubtedly, it was the return to in-person events. Starting with NIGA in July, we were reminded of how beneficial it is to attend these tradeshows. 

We make valuable connections with clients and receive insightful feedback on our products. Attending G2E was also a major highlight for us because we reunited with the full TransAct gaming team in America for the first time in nearly two years. 

We look forward to hopefully seeing our global team in 2022!

This year you presented the most advanced TITO printer on the market, the Epic Edge and its companion, the tabletop Epic Edge TT. How did the operators respond to these products?

Operators were very pleased with our Epic Edge. They mentioned the ease of updating firmware with the Micro SD card, the single interface board with both serial and USB, and the 300 DPI printhead that produces great looking tickets and saves their players time because they do not have to keep refeeding tickets into the slot machine.

The same can be said for the Epic Edge TT. Addressing a growing need in the marketplace for tabletop printing, the printer packages the Epic Edge printer, power supply and ServerPort in a tidy, compact design for use on table games, players’ club desks and cash desks. 

What new products can we expect to be launched in 2022?

We have some projects in the works, but we will also continue to showcase our latest product, the Epicentral Mobile Host solution! 

Together with the Epic Edge, Epicentral prints intelligent promotional offers at the slot machine or table games while the guest is playing. 

With the addition of Epicentral Mobile host running on an iPad or Android tablet, casino slot floor managers will have a real-time dashboard of every player and activity on every game in the casino, paired with available offers and coupons, giving them the ability to instantly deliver promotions to their best players. 

Additionally, Epicentral Mobile Host can provide a drill-down list of each slot machine player session to give hosts the ability to assess if a well-timed reward can further enhance play for their customer.

If for any reason a player’s reward coupon has been damaged or lost, the host can look up and reprint rewards on-demand. 

Casino Marketing and Slot Floor Managers can also view active promotions and coupons and select which offer they would like to award at the moment.

How did you manage to stay in force during the pandemic?

We prioritized communication and found a way to work remotely with both our employees and customers. Thankfully, despite these challenges, we still managed to accomplish many targeted goals.

We continued to receive jurisdictional firmware approval for our new Epic Edge and we began the process of switching our customers over from our award-winning legacy printer the Epic 950 to the all-new Epic Edge. 

The team also worked really hard on BOHA!, our ever-growing brand for restaurants and c-stores. 

“By working smarter, more efficiently and using technology tools, we found ourselves stronger than ever.”

Tracey Chernay, Senior Vice President, Global Casino, Gaming and Lottery at TransAct Technologies.

What are the biggest challenges for 2022?

It goes without saying that the pandemic is still out of our control on a world-wide level. This makes it difficult for our team in Macau and Australia, as they are unable to travel but they continue to operate remotely for now. 

Also, with the rising number of cases and the postponement of the ICE Show we’ll have to redouble our efforts to reach out to customers remotely.

Although we have run into some supply chain issues, the impact on our customers was minimized with the safety stock that we built into our system. 

Our top-notch operations team is working overtime being creative and resourceful and has not disappointed any of our customers during this challenging time.