All forms of gaming will grow steadily in coming years, but online gaming is set to experience the most explosive growth. Online integrated gaming solutions offer an important means for online gaming sites to differentiate themselves from the competition
People around the world love to gamble and there is a major industry that seeks to meet their demand. The global gambling market today is commonly accepted to be in the region of US$250–300 billion. Global Betting and Gaming Consultants (GCBC) compiled the table below – though it has already revised its 2004 estimates upward to US$238 billion. This is very similar to the Christiansen Capital Advisors estimate of US$243 billion for 2004, but compiling data on a global basis is a difficult task and should only be treated as approximate.
It must be pointed out that both GCBC’s and Christiansen’s estimates are based on “legal gaming yield” and do not include grey market betting activities. The Asia Pacific market in particular has considerable grey market operators and betting levels, particularly in the sports betting field, which might easily add a further US$30–US$50 billion to these numbers.
The Asian gaming landscape continues to expand, with Singapore the latest regional jurisdiction to permit casino activities with its recent granting of two licenses to Las Vegas Sands and Genting. Japan has now all but formally confirmed that its first casinos will be approved within the next 2 years (Source: Dr. Toru Mihara, Advisor to casino Study Group, Liberal Democratic Party). In Asia, fully licensed casino operations are now permitted in Cambodia, Korea, Macau, Malaysia, Philippines and Vietnam. Legalised and regulated horse racing and sports betting is also offered in Hong Kong, Japan and Singapore, with nearly all Asian countries also offering a variety of government lottery products.
In Asia, online gaming should not be regarded as just being internet based gaming or gambling, as considerable crossover already exists between physical outlets (that may be internet or more commonly intranet linked) where gaming is taking place. Gaming can be conducted by end users or players over the internet, local intranet, mobile telephone, IDTV (interactive television or set top box television), betting kiosks (land based betting or gaming terminals) or other transmission forms.
Many international analysts may still not fully understand the Asia Pacific market very well and the graphs on page 20 may not truly reflect the current position or future market share.
Based on anecdotal information from Asia-focused operators and the author’s additional research, Asian online gaming is probably only about 0.5% of total Asian gambling, with online sports betting representing approximately 90% of the online gaming space, live video stream casino gaming making up approximately 6%, and all other forms of online gaming the remaining 4%.
To survive and grow in a competitive global environment, online gaming sites must find a sustainable way to differentiate themselves from competitors. This requires continuous innovation, new business models, and the ability to deliver new products and services as quickly as possible.
A common trend across the world is to try and integrate as many forms of gaming as possible (or desirable) through a single reporting mechanism. Online integrated gaming solutions aim to increase the share-of-wallet by cross marketing a range of gaming products and maximizing the customer relationship. The main driver is commercial opportunity, i.e. the more products that can be offered to an end user customer or player through a single interface, website, or betting shop, and the more knowledge retained about that player (or a particular group or demographic of players), the better the commercial return.
Playtech Case Study
Another important factor when integrating multiple gaming or gambling options through a single interface or linked interfaces is that it provides considerable data about a player and their betting patterns. Whilst this has obvious commercial benefits, it also allows operators to better monitor problem gaming, gaming addiction, money flows and potential fraudulent or money laundering activities. Groups such as Playtech can produce software and platforms in many gaming areas, but no one group offers platforms for all products, so Playtech integrates with multiple third party systems in the areas it does not provide services itself.
As far as the various channels for gaming, the following appear most relevant for China:
• Land based gaming outlets
• Online play via the internet or an intranet utilising PC’s from home or possibly internet cafes
• Online play via the internet or an intranet utilising mobile telephones and other portable devices
• Online play via Interactive TV or purpose built ‘TV set top boxes’.
Nearly all forms of gaming (other than sports betting) can also be offered in “Play for Fun” mode, or “Play for Prizes” mode as well as “Play for Real/Cash” mode. This may be important for promotional activities or in areas where it may be sensitive to offer “Play for Real” gaming such as on mobile phones. With mobile phones in particular, subscription gaming may be more appropriate.
Playtech just announced a landmark five-year software licensing agreement to distribute and promote Texas Hold’em Poker in the Chinese market with Sino Strategic International (SSI), which through its subsidiary, Shanghai Kelo, operates the largest corporate retail gaming network in China, distributing legalised keno, lotto, and Video Lottery Terminals (VLTs). A selection of Playtech powered P2P Chinese tournament games are expected to be offered at selected SSI outlets in China in the first half of 2007.
Playtech is also seeking to review integration with any existing systems or gaming businesses already permitted in China, or new platforms to be introduced such as sports betting systems. Below is an outline of how Playtech addresses the integration and aggregation issues.
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Playtech Integrated Platforms
The Playtech gaming platform provides the foundation upon which all its licensees’ operations are built. It comprises dedicated software components that address the manifold mission-critical functions of sophisticated online operations, such as random number generation, affiliate and web tracking, transaction processing, system security, player base management and integration with third party software platforms and multiple payment processing solutions. The platform’s modular architecture, full scalability and built-in redundancy enables it to grow with an operator’s enterprise and accommodate future product diversification, while ensuring maximum availability at all times. The entire system is secured – inside and out – using powerful encryption methodologies and advanced access protocols.
Security and system integrity are key to the Playtech gaming platform and are manifested both in the physical infrastructure of the system as well as its operational and functional elements. Designed and built according to the strict criteria of IT systems used in the banking and finance world, Playtech employs a mix of hardware, software and procedural security and redundancy measures to protect its gaming system – and the sensitive data it contains – from malicious intrusion or unforeseen calamitous events.
The platform can incorporate the broad range of gaming applications especially designed by Playtech to allow operators to target a wide and diverse player base. This is especially relevant to operators who cater to a variety of player types – traditional land-based player, sportsbook-poker fans, bingo-slots communities, and so forth. The option of connecting to the Playtech progressive network, WinAJackpot.com, featuring several different jackpots, millions of dollars in prize money and games with 3D interactive, animated bonus stages, is available across the product range and enhances the gaming proposition considerably.
The Playtech system enables existing operators to seamlessly migrate their entire player database into its own platform, while keeping all essential user account information – such as usernames and passwords – intact. Alternatively, existing operations such as sportsbooks or casinos built on other software platforms can run in tandem with the Playtech system through a number of proprietary mechanisms and tools that preserve database homogeneity and enable single user account access and funding between the two systems.
Whilst possibly not so relevant for the China domestic market, Playtech gaming products are available in 19 major European and Asian languages translated by native gaming enthusiasts using local gambling parlance including game screens, help files, messages and true dealer voices. One possible use of the multi-language options may be as part of the 2008 Olympics where betting platforms could be integrated as part of China’s Olympics offering, provided to global players who have an interest in the Olympics.
The Playtech systems offer a wide range of tools and functions to assist operators, including:
• User Knowledge Base and Tracking: gaming habits, correspondence records, full financial financial history, session info (games played, time spent in each game, game outcome, hands played, etc.), as well as player likes and dislikes.
• Advanced Automated Bonus System: define automatically awarded bonuses according to a broad scope of filters and conditions, including – per payment method/currency/deposit amount/advertiser/ time period (scheduled bonuses, e.g. weekend specials, mid-week happy hours, etc) per first/not first deposit, plus automatic wagering requirement calculation and bonus redemption.
• Live Online Support: instantly connects players with support representatives via 1-on-1 chat without players having to leave the client software.
• Customizable User Reports: operators can request tailor-made reports – delivered to them within days – for specific business requirements using a multitude of query possibilities, with the ability to export the results to an external file.
• Configurable per Player VIP Level: deposit and table limits, comp points conversion rates, withdrawal commissions and waiting periods, and many other variables.
• Affiliate Management/Tracking Program: analyze click-thru/deposit rates, manage campaigns, create profiles, multi-tier marketing allows affiliates to manage sub-affiliates and determine the data displayed on different affiliates’ sites, calculate affiliate revenues according to tier level, formula, etc.
China is one of the fastest adopters of mobile phone technology and Chinese peo- ple, like other Asians, are avid mobile phone users. Mobile phone gaming penetration and mobile gaming growth forecasts are set out in the graphs above and below.
Playtech’s mobile product advances its expertise – gaming management – into the mobile gaming world. Full mobile-backend integration allows players to access the same account from both PC and mobile devices, enabling operator control regardless of player channel utilization. The backend comprises the foundation of all licensees’ operations, addressing the daily missions of all online gaming operators, from random number generation to affiliate and web tracking and player base management. Through advanced audio and visual content, Playtech’s mobile software promotes instant player recognition of casino brands and utilizes a fully functional in-game, multi-currency, multi-language wireless cashier capable of supporting the more popular deposit and withdrawal methods.
A key factor in a mobile product’s success is its handset support capabilities. The number of handset models supported by a particular piece of software determines the market potential and client reach of that software. Playtech’s mobile product has been designed to support a wide spectrum of mobile devices from all of the major manufacturers, from entry-level mass market models to high-end smart phones.
In the technologically-driven mobile industry, the capability to quickly adapt existing software to the latest models is vital. New technologies transform not only the look and feel of a product’s design, but also the way it operates. New market opportunities in diverse geographical areas call for a mobile product that can be easily configured to support the handsets dominant in that area. Playtech’s forward-thinking policy has prepared a global solution for a global market, a flexible mobile product capable of easily facilitating support for both new markets and the latest handsets.
The mobile product delivers an ideal player experience through advanced technology that successfully duplicates the feeling of computer game play to the mobile device. A user-friendly interface guaranteeing easy player navigation is accessed by means of push-buttons on the mobile device. A suite of Playtech’s most popular games complements a high game integration rate that quickly merges new game additions into the mobile product, while free practice mode allows players to download games and instantly play for fun with no sign up necessary. Additional highlights include: game play history, online help, high speed game play, real sound effects, and online messages.
The combination of mobile handsets and online gaming demands software security of the highest standard to protect valuable personal information from malicious intrusion. Only the highest encryption methods from the worlds of banking, government and finance are deployed by Playtech to ensure that all personal information is safeguarded.
