Casinos Austria’s General Director Bettina Glatz-Kremsner to step down

After careful consideration, Glatz-Kremsner informed the Supervisory Board at today’s meeting that she will not be extending her contract next year, citing personal reasons. The timely notification allows the Supervisory Board a full year to arrange for a successor. 

“In the coming year, our corporate group will lose Bettina Glatz-Kremsner, our figurehead of the past years and even decades.  By taking this responsible step, Bettina Glatz-Kremsner is ensuring that her succession can be organised optimally and for the good of the company,” Supervisory Board President Wolfgang Hesoun stated in his remarks on this decision.

"On behalf of the Sazka Group as the majority shareholder of the company, I would like to thank Bettina for her contributions over all these years and in particular for her role in the top management levels during occasionally challenging times. We’re grateful to Bettina for her timely notification of not being available to extend her contract, which now allows the Supervisory Board to take action in its search for a successor with strong industry experience to take up the leadership role in the company as quickly as possible in these challenging times. A professional transition process is very important to us,” said Robert Chvatal, CEO of the SAZKA Group and Vice President of Casinos Austria AG’s Supervisory Board.

Supervisory Board Meeting

At its Supervisory Board meeting (March 30th), the operator said the corona pandemic left ‘deep marks’ on the balance sheets of both Casinos Austria and Austrian Lotteries Group in the past financial year. All 12 domestic casinos and 21 WINWIN locations were closed for a total of 135 days due to Corona in 2020 and the 26 international companies also had numerous closed days, consolidated gross gaming revenue (group turnover) came in at €1.134bn from €1.359bn a year earlier. The consolidated result fell to EUR €0.95m compared to €112m in 2019.

Restructuring costs of around €55m, which were incurred in the course of the ReFIT restructuring program, and impairments of around €21m were noticeable as additional burdens.

The company said: “The black zero at group level was saved by one-time effects. On the one hand, there was an increased number of multiple jackpots in lotteries in the “6 out of 45” lottery last year. On the other hand, it has been possible to successfully channel casino guests to the digital offer of the online gaming site win2day.at. With 594 million euros in taxes and contributions in Austria, the group remains one of the country’s largest taxpayers, although declining revenues over the past year are reflected here as well, of course (2019: 643 million euros).