International Game Technology CEO Discusses Benefits Of Merging With Parent GTECH S.p.A.

Shares of International Game Technology

closed almost 6 percent up on Tuesday following the official merger of the company with its parent company GTECH S.p.A.. The merged entity will be called International Game Technology PLC. Marco Sala, IGT CEO, was on CNBC Tuesday to discuss the deal that will see the world's biggest slot machine maker joining forces with the world's largest lottery systems. Time Taken For Completing The Deal "It's one year and it has been a long period of time, but look this was a company that was 12 years ago 1 lottery in Italy," Sala said. "Now we are here at the New York Stock Exchange becoming the leading company of this industry being no. 1 in lottery, no.1 in the gaming machine space and even in the interactive space. Benefits Of The Merger Sala was asked what the increased scale of the company will now allow it to do. He replied, "I think that the most important thing is that we are already serving [100] governments in the world. Governments are looking at regulated business, regulated gaming as an opportunity to increase their revenues and with this combination, with the portfolio we have we are able to follow any development that they might have in mind." Growth On the company's outlook for growth, Sala said, "Yes I think of the market [they are expected to grow] over the next years, by the way we are seeing in the last months some pickup in the gaming revenues here in U.S. If this trend is confirmed we can expect commercial operator buying more machines overtime."