We are starting this week by recapping some of the most prominent events and news that happened last week. This time we’ve separated our seemingly endless news feed into several categories — New Beginnings & Celebrations, Podcasts & Interviews, New Deals & Partnerships, and Scandals. Feel free to scroll down to a category that attracts you the most, but then make sure to get back to all the others, as we are always delighted to bring you stories that shake the industry week in and week out. So, let’s dive right in!
New Beginnings & Celebrations
Parimatch Tech announced its intention to focus on B2B business by introducing a new brand – GR8 Tech. The new brand will offer enterprise customers a wide range of services and options, including turnkey sports and casino betting platforms, payment centers, CRM tools, risk and fraud prevention systems, gamification and more.
Singular celebrated one year as part of the world’s leading online sports betting and gaming company – Flutter Entertainment. In little over twelve months, Singular became Flutter’s technology asset and strengthened its Tier 1 brand portfolio — Paddy Power, Betfair, Sky Bet, and The Stars Group.
SOFTSWISS sportsbook solution celebrated its second anniversary. Compared to the last year, provider’s GGR increased by 485%, the total number of bets increased by 795%, and the turnover – by 654%.
DeGameFi announced the creation of a new investment fund to support the development of the WEB3 projects in the region.
“Georgia has a great potential to grow in WEB3, we see a lot of projects starting up here by local and international entrepreneurs. Having a team of experts who can unite and guide both investors and founders in this field will complement the growth,” — Yosef Shaftal, Founder and CEO of the Israeli Blockchain Association.
Winter Cup, the largest eSports tournament in Georgia, will take place at the Olympic Palace in Tbilisi. The total prize fund for the championship is 100,000 Gel ($38 000). The Grand Finale of this tournament’s 2nd edition will be held in seven disciplines: eFootball, DOTA 2, TEKKEN 7, FIFA 23, CS:GO, NBA, and Pubg Mobile. The tournament is organized thanks to the support from Europebet and Georgia Computer Sports Federation.
Podcasts & Interviews
Florian Diederichsen, CTO at OpenBet, in a recent SBC podcast, outlined the ways in which entertainment is rapidly becoming the focal point of the user experience, and how to increase the demand for immersive content.
“Big names such as Flutter and Entain want to be seen as a sports entertainment company and not a betting organization,” — sums up Diederichsen.
Diederichsen has been in the sports content industry for more than 30 years, in 2022 he joined OpenBet, which is a premium sports software provider for the last 25 years. Learn more about modern player engagement techniques in the SBC podcast.
Ivan Kravchuk, CEO at Evoplay, in his interview to SBC, detailed the importance of standing out at «huge and very important events», tracking industry-wide trends and identifying gaps in the market, and making a proper debut at a game studio event ahead of this year’s ICE London that would traditionally take place at ExCel on February 7—9.
Dmytro Voshkarin, CEO at GG.Bet, talked about the role of the virtual sport products that open up new betting opportunities for players and operators alike by utilizing familiar sports format in different forms of players engagement and opportunities to cross-sell.
Scandals
1xBET denied the allegations that their Curacao license has been suspended and that the company continues to do business in Russia. The betting company with its HQ in Cyprus has issued a statement refuting claims that 1XBET’s Curaçao business was declared bankrupt by the Dutch Supreme Court.
New Deals & Partnerships
Soft2Bet, a leading iGaming platform provider and content aggregator, signed a distribution agreement with Playson, a well-known online casino content provider, to offer their clients over 80 games from the game developer’s portfolio, including such hits as Solar Queen Megaways and Legend of Cleopatra.
DAZN signed a global distribution partnership with Amazon to offer consumers live sports in the form of a Prime Video channel. The new partnership seems to be a win-win for both parties as Amazon needs more sports content to gradually transition into specialized sports products, and DAZN needs to expand their audience, which is something they may do with the help of Amazon and without huge marketing costs.
3 Oaks Gaming, a distributor of casino games and marketing tools, signed a content distribution agreement with the online operator PIN-UP Ukraine. The deal with 3 Oaks Gaming will give PIN-UP players the access to the distributor’s extensive iGaming portfolio, including its popular games Sticky Piggy and Rio Gems: Hold and Win and Eggs of Gold.
Stay tuned for more news this week and subscribe to our Telegram channel!
