For gaming operators, data security and compliance issues are essential elements of system integrations. Protecting consumer data, securing communications, and attaining regulatory compliance also is crucial.
Sightline Payments Head of Product Mandi Hart
Adding cashless payments to an operator’s CMS adds another feature that requires expert technology.
‘When you layer in cashless payments, it is even more critical to ensure integrations with vendors check all of those boxes,” says Sightline Payments Head of Product Mandi Hart, “and gives comfort to the operator that their transactions and their customer data is safe. …. For Sightline, our extensive knowledge in gaming and payment, as well as banking, gives us the unique ability to work with our operator partners and provide them guidance.”
According to Hart, cashless payments add another layer that must be properly addressed.
“With cashless payments, it’s even more critical to ensure integrations with vendors, to check all those boxes and give comfort to the operator that their transactions and their customers data is safe,” Hart says.
Sightline provides more than 80 points of integration to operators no matter which system they deploy. The company’s involvement can include assistance with regulatory issues, the development of internal controls and processes, and training.
“We integrate with the systems, and they integrate to us,” Hart says, adding that “We see both sides. We provide relationships connecting our operator to their customers. And then we have the relationship to connect operators to banking systems and payment systems. When we talk about the types of integrations, we have multiple integrations that would be used with operators and operator platforms.”
Those include integrations with mobile devices that allow consumers to engage in Sightline’s services.
According to Hart, the core of Sightline’s technology is its open architecture infrastructure that is neutral to any system. Sightline can communicate with various CMS loyalty systems, slot machine hardware, table game solutions or sports betting applications.
“We do not have any exclusivity, which allows us to have a broad range of integrations with various types of systems, including point-of-sale for retail transactions and purchases,” Hart says.
Over the past decade, Hart has noticed the modernization of many CMS. However, there are often variations within systems, and many require a system configuration or upgrade, which Sightline can address through multiple options.
“Operations can integrate with us based on their system, based on their configurations,” she says, “which allows us to nimble as well as dynamic, and gives that flexibility for the operators to be able to offer cashless, even in smaller casino properties that maybe don’t have the resources and, of course, with varying customer bases. We do a solution based on the operator.”
When first engaging with a property, Sightline will assess the landscape of a CMS to determine its capabilities and get a feel for what integrations are present, and what nuances or adaptations need to be part of a solution. A product deployment team will then guide the client operator through the implementation process, which takes 9-12 weeks depending on the system and the level of integration required.
“For example, if we are doing a land-based property and we are integrating to a slot CMS system, a table games system as well as mobile sports betting system as part of that full solution, then all of those things are encompassed in that 9-12 weeks,” Hart says. “We run all of the pieces in parallel. We drive all of operators through the full process, even to include of their internal controls, making sure their compliance teams understand all of the training across the operations area.”
