Merit
History
Merit Industries, Inc., was established in 1977 in Bensalem, Pennsylvania.
In the early 1980s they started developing their own standalone video games, with around a dozen of poker machines being released in this decade. Their 1994 "Pit Boss: Megatouch" release started the Megatouch range of touch machines that ended up becoming a market leader in the US.
In 2002, the Harbour Group acquired Merit Industries. This division was combined with jukebox maker Rowe International to become AMI Entertainment Network in 2004. Megatouch, LLC was spun into its own entity in 2013 and closed in 2014.
Megatouch Machines
The software running on their machines could be upgraded by buying a kit consisting of a Security Key and some kind of storage media (ROM Chips for earlier releases, CD\DVD-ROMs for the later ones). It was also possible to upgrade some machines from a specific generation to the next one (ex.: MAXX to Force), where the kit would also include additional hardware (motherboard and I/O card).