Pollard Banknote buys California bingo electronics maker for $14.4M

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This article was published 24/03/2025 (242 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Winnipeg-based Pollard Banknote Ltd. announced Monday it is purchasing California company Pacific Gaming LLC, a maker of electronic bingo card devices and other bingo management systems.

Pollard Banknote has risen over the past three decades to become the world’s second largest manufacturer of instant lottery tickets. It’s also the market leader in the emerging internet lottery business.

It also has a significant stake in the legacy “charitable gaming” space.

Charitable gaming represents about 30 per cent of Pollard’s revenue, which totalled $557 million in 2024. The company has been bolstering that side of the business for several years with a number of acquisitions.

Pacific’s products add to Pollard’s portfolio, which includes paper pull-tabs, electronic pull-tabs, bingo paper, pull-tab vending machines and bingo daubers.

“Charitable gaming is a great market,” said John Pollard, company co-CEO. “You might have thought that old legacy product would have died off by now, but it’s hanging in. The people are still playing, whether it is pull tab tickets break-open or old-fashioned newsprint bingo paper.”

He said the expansion into the electronic version of pull-tab tickets and electronic bingo has expanded the audience. “The market is still strong for charitable gaming, driven somewhat by the electronic side.”

Pollard Banknote paid $14.4 million for Pacific, funded from existing cash resources and availability under its credit facilities.

“It’s not a huge acquisition for us, representing only about one per cent of our enterprise value, but it all adds up,” Pollard said.

The devices Pacific makes — the size of an iPad — are sometimes referred to as a bingo minder. They will follow along with the bingo caller and allows the player to play more bingo faces on the same game.

Although potential U.S. tariffs are causing many Canadian companies to think about having U.S. production, that did not factor into Pollard’s decision to do this deal, the company said.

Pollard Banknote has had a significant U.S. production presence for some time and is home for about 1,000 of its 2,500 total employees.

“We are fortunate,” Pollard said. “Although we have not always done so in the past, we can produce pretty much all our U.S. products for our U.S. customers in the U.S.”

He said the company has long understood with state-level procurement, governors want to buy made in the U.S. products. “Even with free trade, there was a strong ‘Buy America’ preference.”

Ironically, he added, Pollard Banknote will likely have a bigger problem with retaliatory tariffs Canada might apply.

“What we produce in Canada for the Canadian market and the rest of the world requires some inputs like machine parts and specialty inks that we have to get from the U.S.,” Pollard said.

However, Pollard said he is sympathetic with the thinking the Canadian government needs to take action against the U.S. tariffs. And he realizes Pollard Banknote is in a much better situation than other Canadian manufacturers that rely on American business.

“We would be in trouble if we did not build U.S. manufacturing all those years ago,” he said.

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca