August 12, 1975, marked another milestone for Bally as its ticker symbol “BLY” flashed across the trading floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). The event marked the first time a gaming company joined the illustrious ranks of the nation’s corporate elite on the NYSE’s trading floor. O’Donnell’s strategy of expansion through mergers and acquisitions was working beautifully. Bally Manufacturing was on the rise.

In 1976, Bally demonstrated its continuing innovation and leadership of the gaming industry by creating a new division, called Slot Data Systems (SDS). As the first fully computerized data-collection system for the casino industry, SDS ushered in a new era of electronic slot management, slot accounting and slot security previously unheard of in the casino industry.

By the end of 1976, Bally Manufacturing sat atop the gaming and amusement industries as the preeminent supplier of slot machines, coin-operated arcade games and slot accounting systems. However, stormy days loomed ahead for the industry giant. That same year, the year of America’s Bicentennial, the New Jersey state legislature voted to allow casino gaming in Atlantic City. In a bold move, Bill O’Donnell seized the opportunity to get into the virgin Atlantic City gaming market on the ground floor. In October 1978, construction began on Bally’s Park Place Hotel & Casino. The hotel opened with great fanfare on Dec. 29, 1979 under a temporary gaming license. Unable to obtain a permanent gaming license from the then-new New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement, O’Donnell voluntarily stepped down from his post as president and CEO of Bally Manufacturing. He always hoped that, some day, he would return to the company that he loved and helped build into an international gaming powerhouse.

In the 1980s, with dedicated managers such as 50-year employee Bob Harpling still waving the Bally flag, Bally Manufacturing went through a series of important transformations.

The company left its main manufacturing plant on Belmont Avenue in1983 and moved to new facilities in Bensenville, with Bally moving its corporate headquarters to an office tower near Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport and expanding its amusement game operations with distribution agreements with the Japanese manufacturers of “Pac Man” and “Space Invaders,” two of the most successful video games ever developed. Imitating Pac Man’s little gobbling video goblins, Bally went on a buying spree of its own. In the mid-1980s, the company diversified its portfolio by gobbling up major theme-park operator Six Flags Corporation, the “Great America” theme park, “Lifecycle” exercise bicycles and Scientific Games (a leading lottery ticket manufacturer). During this period Bally also purchased the MGM Grand hotels in Las Vegas and Reno, the Golden Nugget Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City and the Health & Tennis Corporation, a major health club operator. Almost overnight, Bally had refocused its corporate identity from that of a slot and amusement game manufacturer to that of a global leisure industry giant. The company then split its former core manufacturing operation into two separate divisions, amusement equipment and gaming equipment, and located them in Franklin Park and Bensenville, Ill., respectively.

O’Donnell died in 1995, having never realized his dream of returning to Bally. As in the passing of company founder Ray Moloney before him, history was about to repeat itself.

Despite divesting itself of its pinball division and Six Flags amusement park operations, Bally’s debt, magnified by its far-flung and cash draining gaming investments, was hurting the company. Nevertheless, Bally managed to still move forward, albeit sporadically, with new product innovations, such as its first video slot in 1982 and its first video poker machine in 1984. This was followed by the System 5000 slot series, based on the newest “stepper motor” electronics-driven technology. Another milestone was reached in 1989 when Bally Gaming, the slot manufacturing arm of the company, moved from its cramped Reno facility into a new 150,000-square foot plant on Bermuda Road in Las Vegas, just south of McCarran International Airport.

In October 1990, New Jersey financier Arthur Goldberg became president and CEO of Bally Manufacturing. Goldberg undertook a massive restructuring of the company, creating Bally Gaming International, Inc. (BGII) as a separate subsidiary of the newly renamed Bally Entertainment, Inc. In July 1992, the corporation spun off Bally Gaming International completely as its own independent company. Bally Entertainment, Inc. then licensed the “Bally” name to Bally Gaming International, which was comprised of three divisions: Las Vegas-based Bally Gaming (slot manufacturing), Reno-based Bally Systems (slot accounting and management) and Hannover, Germany-based Bally Wulff (wall machines). The original Bally Manufacturing Company thus completed its metamorphosis into Park Place Entertainment, having merged with Hilton Hotels Corporation’s gaming division in the mid-1990s to create the world’s largest gaming corporation.

Meanwhile, Bally Gaming International, Inc. had returned to its core business of manufacturing slot machines. Energetic and talented Hans Kloss, head of the successful and profitable Bally-Wulff division, became president and CEO of Bally Gaming in May 1993. In the spirit of Ray Moloney and Bill O’Donnell, Kloss took a personal, hands-on approach to managing the company. Thanks to innovation, imagination and sound business planning, Bally Gaming was once more on the rise. The company rebounded in 1994 with the “Game Maker®,” the world’s first touch-screen video slot machine. This breakthrough game allowed players to enjoy up to 10 different games, from video poker and keno to blackjack, just by touching the screen. Once again, Bally had leapfrogged ahead of the competition. In March 1996, Game Maker, which sold tens of thousands of units over the years, received the coveted “Excellence in Leadership Award” by the gaming industry for its revolutionary design.

The latest chapter in Bally’s 75-year history began on June 18, 1996 with the merger of Bally Gaming International, Inc. and Alliance Gaming Corporation.

With the advent of a new century, Bally has indeed come full circle. As founder Ray Moloney intended, the company is once again focused on producing the world’s best gaming devices. A new management team, headed up by former Manhattan Associates, Inc. president Richard M. Haddrill, is forging ahead with a variety of exciting and innovative games and slot systems for the global casino industry.

In 1998, Bally Gaming introduced Thrillions®, a wide-area linked progressive jackpot system, to the casino industry, with cartoon icon Betty Boop™ as the initial game theme on the link. The Thrillions network allows players to vie for the same linked jackpots, ranging from thousands of dollars to more than a million dollars. The Thrillions wide area progressives are unique in that they permit players to play for the same jackpot while playing different machines of different denominations, such as nickel, quarter and dollar slots. Currently there are nearly 2,900 games on separate Thrillions links in casinos throughout Nevada, Mississippi, New Jersey and various Native American gaming establishments across the country.

One of the many video gaming innovations to come from Bally recently was called “EVO™”. The EVO VIDEO game platform was created in part through a unique Rapid Development Partnership (RDP) with Microsoft Corporation. Both the EVO VIDEO and EVO HYBRID slots continued the tradition of innovation which began with the original Ballyhoo pinball machine.

Another innovative division driving Bally’s ongoing success through the years, Bally Systems continues to dominate the rapidly expanding slot accounting market. Recent acquisitions of such companies as Casino Marketplace, MindPlay and Advanced Casino Systems Corporation (ACSC) further broaden Bally Systems portfolio of slot management, accounting and software products. There are currently several hundred thousand gaming devices being monitored by SDS and ACSC in hundreds of casinos worldwide. Casino Marketplace provides a complete suite of software-driven slot promotions. ACSC offers casinos a comprehensive array of slot management tools. And MindPlay is the creator of a unique blackjack table game that uses state-of-the art optics for player-tracking and security purposes. The Company’s most recent systems acquisitions include the former Honeyframe, Ltd. of Telford, England and Micro Clever Consulting (MCC) of Nice, France. Both companies offer the global gaming market their own robust and scalable suites of powerful slot accounting and casino management systems, further complementing Bally Systems’ global product capabilities.

Bally, meanwhile, continues to build on a turnaround that took the publicly traded company from the brink of Nasdaq delisting in 2000 to record revenues and profits just two years later. A historic milestone occurred on December 12, 2002 when Alliance Gaming Corp. made the jump from NASDAQ to the “Big Board” of the venerable New York Stock Exchange. Trading under the ticker symbol “AGI,” the Company’s executives celebrated the occasion by ringing the exchange’s opening bell surrounded by costumed representatives of the company’s many themed slot products.

In 2004, Bally acquired Reno, Nevada-based Sierra Design Group (SDG), a well-respected developer of gaming devices and systems, primarily for the expanding Class II Native American and government-run central-determination video lottery businesses. SDG also develops and distributes a variety of traditional Class III gaming devices, including the award-winning “Raining Diamonds” video slot which actually dispenses genuine diamond jewelry right on the slot machine itself. With the acquisition of SDG, Bally acquired the rights to the company’s groundbreaking “ALPHA” operating system. ALPHA offers superior game performance, cashless (Ticket-In/Ticket-Out) capability and enhanced player features.

The year 2004 also saw another important development in the history of the company as Richard Haddrill took over on October 1 as President and Chief Executive Officer. Haddrill has served on the Board of Directors for Alliance since April 2003 and most recently completed five years as CEO of Manhattan Associates, Inc., a leader in software solutions to the supply chain industry throughout the world. During his tenure at Manhattan, the company expanded its product offerings and market share, more than tripled revenues to almost $200 million and increased its share price more than eight fold. Mr. Haddrill previously served as President and CEO for Powerhouse Technologies, Inc., a successful technology and gaming company from September 1996 until June 1999, when Powerhouse was acquired by Anchor Gaming, a publicly traded gaming company that was acquired by International Game Technology in 2001.

From a humble, Depression-era tabletop pinball machine that started it all to the 21st century’s latest high-tech gaming products and systems, Bally is back on top as it celebrates more than 75 years as “The World’s Game Maker.” Company founders Ray Moloney and Bill O’Donnell most certainly would be proud.