The next stage in the battle for control of Europe's premier gaming show was reached this week with news that major show organiser Reed had pitched for a G2E Europe in January 2012.

The surprise was that another organiser invited to pitch, Swan Events, has joined with Reed for a two-company bid.

A group of European-based exhibitors, some of them American-owned, had invited the organisers of the current ICE Totally Gaming show, due to be held at Earls Court, London, in January, plus Reed and Swan to bid for a new show.

This is because of the long-term plan to demolish Earls Court, now established as the home of ICE, the main European casino equipment event and widely regarded as a ‘must go’ show ranking with the G2E shows in Las Vegas and Macau. The ICE show is owned and operated by Clarion Events.

Although content with the current show and its location, the eventual removal of Earls Court was seen as an opportunity to start with a ‘clean sheet’, and concerns expressed for the future by some exhibitors has led to the G2E brand name coming into the picture. The G2E name is jointly owned by Reed Exhibitions and the American Gaming Association.

Reed manages the Las Vegas G2E show on behalf of AGA, the powerful operators’ association in the US, and its associate the AGEM, the Association of Gaming Equipment Manufacturers,  which is largely US-led. Swan Events is a London-based exhibition organiser headed by former Clarion executive Karen Cooke and handles the annual amusement and street gaming trade show, the European Amusement and Gaming Expo on behalf of BACTA, the UK trade association. EAG is held at ExCel in London on the same dates as ICE at Earls Court.

The Reed bid for a European G2E was lodged this week, naming Swan Events as its operational ‘arm’, but the Reed pitch was headed by the organisations German subsidiary, based in Düsseldorf.

Christian Meyerhofer, director of business development at Reed Germany, said: "A European show for the casino industry would have a 75 per cent European attendance and those visitors are of paramount importance. A European event would have to be developed to appeal to them. Second comes the exhibitors and their needs must be addressed. The invitation to pitch for this came to us through our headquarters in London. It was decided that the experience of Reed Germany in Düsseldorf, in organising shows for the gaming industry (Reed manages the Ima show for the street market in Germany) made us a logical choice to head this bid."

Meyerhofer stressed that the move to clarify the position and future of a casino trade show in Europe was European-led. "It was a European initiative by a group of European exhibitors. It was also very logical for us to use the G2E brand name, partly because of our part-ownership of that brand name and of course because it is such a strong brand within the industry."

Karen Cooke at Swan Events told us yesterday: "Swan’s role will be to liaise with the exhibitors and smooth the path of their appearance at a new show. I know all of them well from my Clarion days and of course I am very familiar with the processes of running a show for this particular industry."

The story is complicated by news that the Reed pitch offers a choice of either London’s ExCel or the Rai Centre in Amsterdam, for the usual third-week January dates in 2012.  Swan Events runs the EAG show for BACTA at ExCel and a European G2E at that location will be seen as a conflict of content. This was backed by the UK trade association’s show manager Martin Burlin yesterday. "We have a contract with ExCel for 2011, 2012 and 2013 and there is a non-compete clause in there, listing products which cannot be shown at another event in the same location at the same time." He confirmed that no deal had been concluded by his organisation and Reed. In the event of a European G2E show at ExCel, Swan would therefore be involved in both events simultaneously.

Both bids are now with the European exhibitors’ group. No formal name has been given to the group; the bids were requested on behalf of a list of names of leading exhibitors and were to be despatched to them all simultaneously. That list includes Atronic, Novomatic, Abbiati, Amatic, Apex, Aristocrat, Astro, Bally,  Casino Technologies, Unidesa, Gold Club, IGT, R Franco, TCS John Huxley and WMS.

The ICE Totally Gaming show is due to be held at London’s Earls Court in 2011 from Tuesday, January 25, to Thursday 27.   EAG is on the same dates at ExCel.