Equibase Company LLC today announced the signing of a memorandum of understanding with California Horse Racing Information Management System, Inc. (CHRIMS) and McKinnie Systems, Inc. designed to consolidate the management of key industry data.

Equibase chairman and Jockey Club chief financial officer, Alan Marzelli, indicated the parties will be working together to determine how information in several areas can be managed more efficiently to provide better service to racetracks and, ultimately, racing fans.

“As the industry’s official database of racing information, we are always seeking ways to enhance collection and management activities to support the information needs of all of our constituents,” he said. “Interfacing some aspects of our operations with CHRIMS and McKinnie will help eliminate overlap and duplication of effort while integrating the various data collection, storage and dissemination activities necessary to eventually account for all Thoroughbred pari-mutuel wagering activity continent-wide.”

The memorandum, which contains a number of short- and intermediate-term strategic initiatives between the parties, initially calls for Equibase to provide pre-race data feeds on a daily basis to CHRIMS. In return, CHRIMS will supply Equibase with a detailed breakdown of handle by location for every track that uses CHRIMS’ simulcast settlement and reconciliation services.

“The ability to populate our software with pre-race information feeds from Equibase is a significant step forward for us,” said CHRIMS president, Mark Thurman. “Eliminating the manual entry of this data will both improve quality and allow us to focus solely on accounting for all-sources handle for our client tracks.”

Subsequent initiatives include the integration of data collection activities between Equibase and McKinnie, as well as the utilization of The Jockey Club's Information Technology Group, through its existing relationship as Equibase's technology service provider, to provide first line monitoring on a 24 hour by 7 day basis for the CHRIMS information network.

“Equibase has relied exclusively on the technological capabilities of The Jockey Club since its inception,” Marzelli added. “Leveraging those capabilities to improve reliability of the CHRIMS information network is a natural step in the overall process of streamlining the collection and management of information for the racing industry.”

Equibase Company LLC is a partnership of The Jockey Club and the Thoroughbred Racing Associations of North America (TRA) and serves as the Thoroughbred industry’s official database for racing information and statistics.

CHRIMS was launched in 1990 to track all-sources handle on California races and provide automatic breakouts of where each wagered dollar should be directed. CHRIMS’ services were adopted by Gulfstream Park for its 2001 meet and currently are being used by Keeneland.

McKinnie Systems is a wholly owned subsidiary of The Jockey Club Information Systems, Inc. and is the software system vendor to more than 75 per cent of the racing offices in North America.