WMS Industries
WMS Industries, Inc. was an American electronic gaming and amusement manufacturer in Enterprise, Nevada. It was merged into Scientific Games in 2016. WMS's predecessor was the Williams Manufacturing Company, founded in 1943 by Harry E. Williams. However, the company that became WMS Industries was formally founded in 1974 as Williams Electronics, Inc.
Williams initially was a manufacturer of pinball machines. In 1964, Williams was acquired by jukebox manufacturer Seeburg Corp. and reorganized as Williams Electronics Manufacturing Division. In 1973, the company branched out into the coin-operated arcade video game market with its Pong clone Paddle Ball, eventually creating a number of video game classics, including Defender, Joust, and Robotron: 2084. In 1974, Williams Electronics, Inc. was incorporated as a wholly owned subsidiary of Seeburg, which changed its name to Xcor International in 1977. Williams Electronics was spun out as an independent company in 1981.
In 1987, the company went public as WMS Industries, Inc. using a shortened version of its name which it also selected for its stock ticker symbol. In 1988, it acquired Bally/Midway, the amusement games division of Bally Manufacturing, which had decided to focus on its casino operating and manufacturing businesses. The video game operations were consolidated under the Midway name, while pinball machines continued to use the Williams and Bally names. After a string of arcade successes by Midway, WMS acquired Tradewest in 1994 to allow the company to publish its own home ports of arcade games directly, instead of licensing them to other publishers. Midway Games was taken public in 1996, and fully spun-off in 1998.
WMS created a subsidiary, WMS Gaming, for manufacturing gambling equipment in 1991. Beginning with video lottery terminals, the division introduced its first slot machines in 1994 and became a major player in the business. It closed its pinball division on October 25, 1999 after the Pinball 2000 concept that integrated a PC screen into the pinball game via a semi-reflective glass failed to meet sales expectations. In 2013, WMS became a wholly owned subsidiary of Scientific Games. In 2016, WMS was merged into Scientific Games, which renamed itself Light & Wonder in 2022.
Early history
engineering graduate Harry Williams entered the coin-operated amusement industry in 1933 and helped popularize several important pinball innovations such as the tilt mechanism, electrically-powered scoring holes, and the ability to win a free play by achieving a certain score. After working for a succession of companies including Pacific Amusement Manufacturing, Rock-Ola, and Exhibit Supply, he went into business with Lyndon Durant in 1942 under the name United Manufacturing. After a break with Durant, Williams founded the Williams Manufacturing Company in 1943 at 161 West Huron Street in Chicago, Illinois. The first seven products were a fortune-telling machine called Selector Scope, two electro-mechanical games, Periscope and Liberator, a novelty called Zingo, a pinball conversion called Flat-Top, another EM arcade game, Circus Romance and a second pinball conversion called Laura. The two pinball conversions were built by purchasing older pinball machines made by other companies and changing artwork and other elements on the playfield. The lack of raw materials during World War II made the manufacture of new machines difficult and expensive. The first all original amusement device made by Williams was a flipperless pinball machine called Suspense. During the late 1940s and early 1950s, Williams continued to make pinball machines and the occasional bat-and-ball game. In 1950, Williams produced Lucky Inning, their first pinball machine to have its bottom flippers facing inward in the modern manner.In 1948, Williams sold 49% of his company to a Philadelphia distributor named Sam Stern, who became a vice president and took over much of the day-to-day running of the company. In 1959, Stern orchestrated a buyout of Williams by Consolidated Sun Ray, a New York retail conglomerate that operated drug stores and discount houses, which renamed the company the Williams Electronic Manufacturing Corporation. Harry Williams left after the buyout, though did occasional work for the company. The last game he designed for Williams was also one of the last electromechanical games, Rancho.
In 1961, Stern bought Williams back from Consolidated Sun Ray. Three years later, the company was acquired by the Seeburg Corporation, which also purchased United Manufacturing. The two amusement companies were consolidated under the Williams name, but moved into the United factory. Sam Stern continued to run the amusement business, which was renamed Williams Electronics in 1967.
In 1962, 3 Coin became the best selling Williams machine with 1,100 units sold. One year later, Skill Pool sold 2,250 units. In 1964 Williams was purchased by the Seeburg Corporation. Its 1966 pinball machine A-Go-Go, with its avant-garde 60s theme, sold a record 5,100 units. Early Williams pinball machines often included innovative features and pinball firsts, such as mechanical reel scoring and the "add-a-ball" feature for locations that didn't allow game replays. By 1967, pinball was in the middle of its so-called "golden age", and the number of pinball units that sold began to increase dramatically. Popular Williams pinballs included Shangri-La, Apollo, Beat Time, Smart Set, Gold Rush, and Space Mission.
Golden age of arcade games
Taking note of Atari, Inc.'s success with Pong in 1972, Williams decided to enter the fledgling coin-operated arcade video game industry. After preliminary negotiations with Magnavox, it subcontracted the Magnetic Corporation of America to create its first arcade video game Paddle-Ball. In 1974, the company was reincorporated as Williams Electronics, Inc. In 1980, Seeburg, facing bankruptcy, sold Williams to Louis Nicastro, who, with his son Neil, would take the company public and run it for over two decades.Williams developed its own breakthrough hit with the release of 1981's Defender, whose gameplay, horizontal scrolling, and dynamic color influenced many subsequent games. It was followed by a sequel in the same year, Stargate, and a group of popular and influential titles: Joust, Robotron: 2084, Sinistar, and the licensed Moon Patrol. With the exception of Sinistar, these were widely ported to home systems by external developers and publishers including Atari.
After Dragon's Lair popularized LaserDisc video games in 1983, Williams created the LaserDisc/computer graphics hybrid racing game Star Rider which lost, or contributed to a loss of, $50 million for the company.
In 1988, Williams acquired Bally/Midway, the consolidated amusement games subsidiary of longtime competitor Bally Manufacturing, which left the business to concentrate on casinos. Midway saw strong sales in the early 1990s with a number of successful arcade games, including Mortal Kombat and NBA Jam. In 1994, the company acquired Tradewest, which it renamed Williams Entertainment, to publish home ports of Midway arcade games. Two years later, WMS acquired Atari Games from Time Warner. That same year, all video game operations were consolidated under Midway, with Atari Games becoming Midway Games West and Williams Entertainment becoming Midway Home Entertainment, while all pinball rights remained with WMS under the Williams brand.
Solid state pinball
Williams' first solid-state machines produced in 1976 were prototype runs based on electromechanical games; Aztec and Grand Prix. Williams continued to release new electromechanical pinball machines through October 1977, when they released their last, Wild Card. From November 1977, Williams released solid-state pinball games exclusively, beginning with their first solid state production model Hot Tip, which sold 4,903 units. From the late 1970s through the 1980s, Williams released numerous innovative pinball games, such as Gorgar, Firepower, Black Knight, Jungle Lord, Space Shuttle, Comet, High Speed, Pin*Bot, F-14 Tomcat, Cyclone, and Taxi.From 1989 through the mid 1990s, a resurgence of pinball during which machines transitioned to dot-matrix displays, Williams had a string of hits including Black Knight 2000, FunHouse, The Machine: Bride of Pin-Bot, Terminator 2, Fish Tales, and The Getaway: High Speed II.
In 1992, the company produced the licensed The Addams Family pinball game based on The Addams Family movie under the Bally label. The Addams Family sold 20,270 units, a record that still stands today. In 1993, the company produced Twilight Zone, which sold 15,235 units. After 1993, though still the market leader, Williams never came close to matching these sales numbers. Williams won the American Amusement Machine Association's 1995 Manufacturer of the Year award. Medieval Madness, produced in 1997, often tops the list as the greatest pinball machine of all time.
In 1999, Williams made one last attempt to revitalize pinball sales with its Pinball 2000 machines that integrated pinball with computer graphics on embedded raster-scan displays. The innovation did not pay off, as the manufacturing expenses exceeded the prices that the market would bear, and that same year, WMS left pinball to focus on slot machine development.