Elizabeth Silva is passionate about delivering strategic initiatives through digital transformation and creating high-value experiences for the global sports, entertainment, gaming, and hospitality industries. She is a Senior Research Analyst at Info-Tech Research Group, where she conducts in-depth primary and secondary research, analyzes data, and develops insights for customers in various industry sectors.

Elizabeth has a strong background in hospitality and tourism management as well as global sports management. She holds an Honours Bachelor of Commerce degree from Humber Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning and a certificate from New York University. She is skilled in teamwork, time management, research, analysis, and thought leadership.

As the Gaming & Hospitality Practice Lead at Info-Tech Research Group, Larry Fretz manages a team of analysts to develop and deliver best-practice research specific to the gaming and hospitality industry. As owner of the GHRC research agenda, he is responsible for agenda planning and directing research in a timely and relevant manner for our customer base. He also provides sales & customer support and delivers advisory consulting services and workshops.

Larry brings more than a decade of international Gaming & Hospitality and 25+ years of overall technology, marketing, supply chain, and other business operations expertise. Larry has held CIO/VP IT and executive leadership positions with the Palms Casino Resort, the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas and Niagara Casinos (Fallsview Casino Resort & Casino Niagara), resulting in respected knowledge and experience of gaming and hospitality systems and understanding of the industry’s strategic, start-up opening and day-to-day challenges. In these hands-on executive roles, he was responsible for all aspects of highly regulated and available enterprise IT from Infrastructure & Operations, Project & Portfolio Management, Security & Risk, CRM, and Architecture & Applications.

Earlier in his career, Larry held executive positions and was recognized for leveraging IT in improving company performance, growth, achieving business goals, and being a subject matter expert across multiple technology areas and business functions at such global companies as Day-Timers and PBB Global Logistics. Larry has been an innovative and action-oriented force in business technology since 1986 when he founded Micro-Wise Systems and developed the first fully computerized library management software solution.

Eric Bowers is the Chief Technology Officer for Boyd Gaming.  Eric has more than 30 years of experience in enterprise-wide application development and data architectures, strategic IT planning and IT support management – focusing on leading technology solutions and business process reengineering.  This includes over 20 years of gaming & hospitality experience.  Eric joined Boyd Gaming from International Game Technologies, where he was Director of Software Engineering for IGT’s enterprise casino and loyalty suite of applications.  Prior to IGT, Eric was the Executive Director of Development at MGM Resorts for over 6 years.  Eric’s previous employment also includes over 12 years of experience in the Big 4 environment, including Andersen Consulting, Ernst & Young and Deloitte – managing large-scale system and methodology implementations for several Fortune 500 companies in manufacturing, health care, financial services, and aerospace.  Mr. Bowers was a double major at Northwestern University in Chicago, Illinois, with a B.S. in Computer Science and a B.A. in Economics.

John Forelli is Senior Vice President & Chief Information Officer, overseeing Ocean Casino Resort’s information technology, and computer systems. John executes the management, implementation, and usability of information and computer technologies that benefit and improve enterprise goals.
 

Notably, John served as Regional Vice President of Information Technology for MGM Resorts International, overseeing the development and launch of MGM National Harbor and MGM Springfield, as well as the acquisitions of MGM Northfield Park in Ohio and Empire Resorts in New York. John was part of the opening team for Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa where he served as Vice President of Information Technology, where among other successful initiatives, he worked with NJ gaming regulators to bring online casino gaming to the state.
 

John received his Bachelor of Sciences in Mathematics from Lafayette College before earning his Master of Business Administration from the University of Rhode Island. John has held Key Gaming Licenses in New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Colorado, and Indiana, with Gaming Licenses in Connecticut, Mississippi, Michigan, and Ohio.

Mr. Frank Bonini is a seasoned Information Technology leader with over 35 years of experience across all areas of IT, including 18 years in the Gaming and Hospitality industry. He attended Rutgers University, majoring in Computer Science, and has worked with industry giants such as AT&T (4 years), Digital Equipment Corporation (10 years), and Microsoft Corporation (9 years).

Mr. Bonini has led or participated in projects spanning infrastructure architecture and deployment, eCommerce, computer security, and application development. He has been a key member of several opening teams for new casinos or enhancements to existing ones, including Borgata, Revel, Ocean Casino Resort, and the Live! Casino properties, which currently number three, soon to be four.