The Illinois State Lottery is reportedly hoping to significantly repair its reputation after provisionally awarding the firm behind The National Lottery in the United Kingdom with a ten-year deal to operate its services. According to a report from the Chicago Sun-Times newspaper, a subsidiary of Camelot Group known as Camelot Illinois LLC was the only entity to bid for the $2.2 billion contract and will now take over the running of the Illinois State Lottery subject to the successful completion of a 14-day “protest period”.
“Camelot [Group] has shown more than a decade of success in managing lotteries throughout the world,” read a statement from Greg Smith, Acting Director for the Illinois State Lottery. “The [Illinois State] Lottery and Camelot Illinois [LLC] have common goals to responsibly grow the [Illinois State] Lottery’s player base, align incentives, eliminate conflicts of interest, introduce new technology and innovation and ensure responsiveness to public needs and concerns.”
Northstar Lottery Group, which is a joint venture of International Game Technology (IGT) and Scientific Games Corporation, became the first private firm in the United States to run a state lottery when it began operating Illinois’ games in July of 2011. However, its contract was cancelled by Republican governor Bruce Rauner two years ago following allegations that it had manipulated the number of winning tickets while failing to meet its promised profit margins. The newspaper cited a release from the Illinois State Lottery as revealing that the agreement with Chicago-based Camelot Illinois LLC has been calculated utilizing a “revised structure” that “aligns financial incentives” and additionally includes the provision of “permanent point-of-sale at retailers, new games and a next-generation iLottery platform” that will support “omni-channel lottery participation”.
Camelot established a local office in the state last year for the express purpose of winning the Illinois Lottery’s business, although it likely didn’t hurt that Camelot was the only bidder for the 10-year contract. The Illinois Lottery had previously been managed by the Northstar Group, a joint venture of Scientific Games Corporation and International Game Technology, which beat out Camelot for the 10-year contract at the start of this decade.
In a clear nod to its previous difficulties, the Illinois State Lottery moreover reportedly declared that the latest contract calls for “transparency and regular audits” while Camelot Illinois LLC is to help the service pursue the Level Four standards of the World Lottery Association.
