SAN DIEGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sorteo Games, Inc. (“Sorteo” or “the Company”), a leading provider of electronic lottery systems and services, announces that Mexico’sOrganization of Internal Control (“OIC”), an office of the Ministry of Public Service, and Federal Justice Department are investigating certain alleged irregularities in GTECH Corporation’s proposal submission to be selected to upgrade and operate the systems and terminals for Pronósticos para la Asistencia Pública (Pronósticos) lottery in Mexico. Sorteo and Win Systems are each also bidding for the same contract. The new license is expected to commence on October 16, 2014 and has a minimum term of six years.

As part of its RFP bid, Sorteo entered into a lottery systems technology agreement with Intralot S.A. to provide the latest digital point-of-sale terminals for all of Pronósticos’ lottery and sports betting products to fully modernize the existing network spanning 10,000 outlets as well as to provide new technology systems and new datacentres. It is anticipated that the network will be expanded to include an additional 10,000 point-of-sale terminals over the following 12-24 months and that new lottery games will be implemented across the entire retail and online network. As part of the tender, Sorteo proposed to supply its proprietary automated lottery technology platform, which provides full integration of all products and distribution channels, and enables the rapid creation of new products and new electronic distribution channels.

The first segment of the tender, which consisted of economic proposals, was undisputedly won by Sorteo, which secured the maximum points for submitting the best commercial offer. It is the award of the second segment of the tender, consisting of technical proposals, to GTECH Corporation, that is currently under investigation. Win Systems’ complaint is based on alleged irregularities committed by representatives of Gtech Systems Inc and Gtech Mexico in submitting additional boxes of commercial and technical offer documents to the RFP Committee after all three bidders’ sealed economic offers had already been opened by the Committee. It was noted in the Public Act that the other bidders disagreed with the Committee’s acceptance of the additional documents submitted by Gtech and that the matter was highly irregular.

Sorteo is further protesting the results of the technical offer valuations after additional alleged irregularities occured when the RFP Committee also improperly disallowed any points to Sorteo for the technology resources that were offered by Sorteo through its pre-existing technology agreement with Intralot. Such an agreement is clearly validated under Article 3 of Section 6 of the Federal Public Law in Mexico, which regulates all acquisitions and all contracts to provide public works and services, the same federal law that regulates the current Pronósticos RFP.

Nour-Dean Anakar, CEO and Founder of Sorteo, said: “By adopting our solution, Pronósticos would be able to generate more money, and more quickly, for public welfare, thanks to our favourable economic proposal and our unique technology platform, which allows for rapid introduction of new games and expansion across new channels. Equally, with our sophisticated systems, the past incidents of widely-reported fraud as well as the technical deficiencies and malfunctions experienced in the past under the current Gtech systems would be eliminated.

“We are deeply disappointed that such irregularities are being allowed to interfere with this process – to the detriment of Mexican society. We hope that justice will prevail and that the best economic offer and truly superior solution will be adopted to facilitate the expansion of the lottery in Mexico.”