JVH Gaming, based in Tilberg, Netherlands, has changed a lot since InterGame last visited its offices in 2007. Helen Fletcher spoke to senior product manager Johan Buijks to find out more as well as future plans...

JVH is split into three divisions - manufacturing, distribution and operations - and has over the years managed to transform itself into an innovative company with strong leading brands in the Netherlands as well as neighbouring European countries.

Since InterGame visited JVH last year there has been a couple of changes to the staff structure with Brenda Paulissen leaving her role as sales manager and Geert Jansen joining the company in October 2007 as marketing and sales manager.

JVH has also stopped the distribution of amusement machines such as Photo Play and Stern Pinball after two of JVH’s former employees, Jos van Esch and Paul Rehmann, founded their own organisation, Game XL, which is based in Rosmalen, Netherlands, and gained the distribution rights for these two companies along with Sega video equipment. This move away from amusement machines by JVH was also related to its increasing focus on the supply of AWP machines.

The three divisions that make up JVH Gaming include: the manufacturing of JVH Gaming products, gaming and entertainment, which covers arcades, and operations which covers single-site operations. The three divisions are all managed by individual directors.

According to senior product manager Johan Buijks, the Dutch AWP market has changed a lot recently for both manufacturers and operators, as the government is eager to increase the tax on gaming machines from 19 per cent to 29 per cent or possibly even higher. The industry is of course arguing against this tax increase and although no final verdict has been given, the industry has become much more defensive when it comes to investing.

"There is also a smoking ban due to come into force this year from July 1," said Buijks. "We anticipate some negative effects, although we are preparing ourselves as much as we can and are now creating games with an option for players to reserve a machine during a game while they go outside to a have smoke. We hope this will keep both players as well as operators happy."

JVH currently distributes machines to 12 different countries, which include Hungary, Germany, Spain and Czech Republic to name a few and although Buijks was keen to keep any new markets currently on the cards close to his chest, it was clear that JVH is always looking for new markets to enter as long as both the timing and market conditions are right.

When we met a year ago JVH was paying particular attention to Lithuania and since then the market has kept on growing for the company. "We have a special category B machine that has been homologated for Lithuania, as well as video multigames," said Buijks. "They are performing very well and we are making progress to obtaining a good share of the market."

The company also operates around 8,000 machines across the Netherlands and according to Buijks the benefits of operating machines is naturally the turnover and profit but it also gains first-hand experience and can compare its own results with that of other operators and relate the costs and benefits on that scale. It also proves as an ideal testing environment for JVH’s machines.

As always, JVH has continued to add to its portfolio of games and over the last few months has released Master Games for multiple countries, Donkey Casino for Hungary and Nevada Casino for Germany. Naturally there are also plans to introduce even more new products, but it was too soon for Buijks to reveal any details on these. And as far as the company’s future is concerned, as a well-established company it continues to look promising.

"As one of the leading operators in the Netherlands and one of the leading game content providers in Europe, we will continue to be one of the few manufacturers that are able to serve the needs of smaller operators throughout Europe," said Buijks.