SC//Platform Delivers 75% Reduction in Physical Footprint and 40% Operational Cost Savings
Saratoga Casino Holdings LLC operates premier gaming, racing, and hospitality properties in Colorado, New York, and Mississippi.
IT Challenges
- Aging, decentralized IT infrastructure with a sprawl of legacy servers and siloed systems
- Limited real-time visibility unable to keep up with volume of transactional data
- Escalating licensing and maintenance costs due to managing hardware across multiple properties
- Vulnerable to cyber threats and compliance gaps without centralized management or backups
- Cybersecurity and compliance risks due to poor central management and backups
The Scale Computing Solution
- Consolidated infrastructure on Scale Computing Platform across all properties
- Streamlined deployment with simplified and reliable virtual machine migration process
- Centralized management of applications, workloads, and critical operational data
- Increased performance, uptime, and resilience at the edge and in remote environments
- Optimized for virtualization and storage, Scale Computing HyperCore keeps casino management systems responsive and resilient.
Customer Results
- Achieved 75% reduction in physical hardware footprint across all IT environments
- Enabled near-instant failover capabilities and significantly improved system uptime
- Reduced IT operational and maintenance costs by more than 40%
- Gained enhanced visibility and real-time insights across gaming and business operations
Saratoga Casino Holdings modernized its casino management and gaming systems infrastructure with Scale Computing, achieving simpler management, reduced costs, and greater reliability. By unifying critical IT services, Saratoga gained the agility needed to stay ahead in the competitive gaming industry.
The Challenge: Modernizing an Overcomplicated IT Footprint
Saratoga Casino Holdings, which operates premier gaming and hospitality properties in New York, Colorado, and Mississippi, faced an IT environment weighed down by decades of accumulated hardware, software, and point solutions. With operations spanning multiple states and a fast-paced, high-transaction business model, the organization struggled to keep its aging infrastructure aligned with modern demands.
Casino operations depend on a Casino Management System (CMS) encompassing everything from slot machine accounting to player rewards. But Saratoga’s legacy infrastructure struggled to keep up with data generated by high-frequency transactions and diverse CMS components like finance, security, and game management modules.
As Saratoga’s CTO Scott Bartgis described, “we were running on a patchwork of servers and applications, each with different support requirements, making the environment brittle and increasingly expensive to maintain. The biggest obstacle wasn’t technology per se, but the complexity of integrating and maintaining systems spread across several states.”
Existing systems lacked centralized visibility, causing delays in processing patron awards and reconciling slot machine data. This hindered the ability to respond quickly to performance or security incidents, a significant risk in a heavily regulated industry.
Another challenge came from vendor compatibility: “If our hypervisor wasn’t the ‘right brand,’ some software vendors simply refused to help us,” Bartgis recalled, referencing previous frustrations with proprietary licensing and hypervisor biases.
Finally, the casino needed a platform flexible enough to extend beyond the casino floor, one that could support an array of emerging use cases like real-time executive dashboards accessible anytime, anywhere.
The Solution: A Simplified, Resilient Platform with Scale Computing
Following a thorough analysis of performance needs, cost structures, and vendor support considerations, Saratoga selected Scale Computing’s SC//Platform to consolidate and modernize their IT environment.
The simplicity of SC//Platform allowed Bartgis’ team to create “stub” virtual machines (VMs) tailored to their needs, import workloads seamlessly, and tweak network settings without downtime. Deployment began by placing VMDK files on a shared SMB location, importing them into Scale Computing, and then adjusting NIC configurations and network drivers, a process that took days instead of weeks.
“I remember thinking, this is too easy. It felt like cheating compared to our past migrations,” Bartgis joked. The platform’s built-in resilience also proved invaluable. “We knew cyber events could happen at the worst time, but with the Scale Computing Platform we gained confidence that recovery wouldn’t mean days of lost revenue.”
Key features like near-instant failover, automated backups, and a user-friendly interface also helped to reduce reliance on costly outside consultants. Saratoga could now manage performance, security, and compliance from a single pane of glass across multiple properties.
Bartgis summed up the deployment: “It just worked. It was clean. And it made us wonder why we waited so long.”
The Benefits: Streamlined Management, Better Performance, Greater Confidence
By consolidating its sprawling, multi-vendor IT environment onto a single, unified platform, Saratoga dramatically simplified its operations. What was once a complex network of loosely integrated systems is now a streamlined, easily managed infrastructure that supports all core casino management functions with greater efficiency.
Since deploying SC//Platform, Saratoga reduced its hardware footprint by 75%, freeing up valuable physical space while cutting energy costs. This leaner infrastructure decreased maintenance demands and extended the life of critical casino management systems.
System performance also improved dramatically: slot accounting data updates, which previously lagged, became nearly real-time. Executive dashboards displayed up-to-date metrics around the clock, even across geographically distant properties.
Bartgis credits SC//Platform’s intuitive user experience for boosting team productivity: “Our small IT team now spends less time fighting fires and more time innovating for guests. That’s priceless in the hospitality sector.”
With routine maintenance and troubleshooting tasks dramatically reduced, the IT team can now focus on delivering new digital experiences, optimizing guest services, and supporting operational improvements across departments.
But perhaps the most salient benefit realized by Saratoga was the financial flexibility gained through streamlined infrastructure and reduced vendor overhead. After rolling out SC//Platform across its environment, Saratoga has recorded over 40% in operational cost savings, enabling Saratoga to reinvest budget and staff time towards initiatives that directly enhance the customer experience, from upgraded kiosks and loyalty programs to new gaming experiences.
As Bartgis reflected, “Scale Computing gave us the agility and peace of mind we need to thrive in today’s gaming industry.” With a modern, scalable platform in place, Saratoga is no longer constrained by outdated systems or vendor lock-in. Instead, they’ve built a flexible foundation that not only supports current operations but is also ready to evolve with the next generation of gaming, hospitality, and data-driven innovation.