senior management departures announced at bwin.party

Publicly listed igaming operator and software supplier bwin.party have announced the departure of three senior level staff members. These are the first high profile departures since CEO Norbert Teufelberger commenced his new streamlining initiative ‘business strategy’ for the operator, in order to tackle declining performance and valuation on bwin party. The announced departures see Business Development Director Alen Lang, Group Technology Director Tod Martin and World Poker Tour (WPT) CEO Steve Heller are all leaving the operator.

Alen Lang steps down after eight years of service, in which he was responsible for bwin party’s US strategy, clinching deals with offline casino resorts MGM and Boyd Gaming. Land was also responsible for bwin party’s highly publicized deal with social gaming operator Zynga. WPT CEO Steve Heller has been made redundant, Hellar joined Party Gaming in November 2005 and also served as CEO for bwin party Asia.  CTO Tod Martin joined  party gaming in 2008 and oversaw the technical integration of the bwin party merger.

Alen Langs replacement is yet to be found, however replacements for Hellar and Martin have been announced. WPT president Adam Pliska will assume the role of CEO and bwin.party announced a new CTO in Guy Duncan recruited in by Norbert Teufelberger in January 2013.

A bwin.party spokesperson has mentioned that the operator will not comment on the above departures. This move is set to see bwin party take a new direction in corporate structure and strategy in the coming months and will likely see more changes at senior level operations. In April 2013 Norbet Teufelberger announced anew digital strategy of focusing on regulated and regulating territories and prioritizing customer value and ROI over volume in order to optimise operator product performance. The operator has also cut advertising and commercial spend by not renewing high coverage partnerships with Real Madrid