GOODBYE 2016…
METRIC GAMING Jim Supple, COO
What was the biggest event for Metric in 2016?
In the summer of this year, Metric Gaming
won the contract to provide a sportsbook for leading gaming operator, Gamesys, in the face of stiff competition from well-established names within the industry.
What do you think was the most important occurrence for the industry in 2016? 2016 has been the year of consolidation, with the mergers of the Paddy Power/Betfair and Ladbrokes/Coral brands providing the
industry with two significant global operators.
What are you most excited about for the
industry in 2017? With the political sea change in the U.S., it
may well reopen the debate to legalise regulated sports betting sooner than expected. This would have the impact of potentially doubling the size of the existing opportunity within the global industry.
What are you most excited about for your
own company in 2017? As we head towards the end of 2016, Metric has just acquired the services of three industry veterans, including myself as COO, at CFO and Trading Director level, who will be based at our newly opened office in London. The fact that Metric has been able to attract this level of experience, adding to the talent already within the business, shows the progress that the company is making and can only bode well for 2017 and our future as an innovative provider of sports betting solutions.
Michael Brady, founder and commercial director
BEDE GAMING
What was the biggest event for Bede Gaming in 2016?
We moved Rank’s digital
business from OpenBet onto the Bede Gaming platform in February. That was a huge project for us and to deliver it
on time and on budget was a massive achievement for our team. The entire team worked long hours to make it happen, and the uplift in Rank’s business as a result has been very positive. There is a lot more to come and Bede will be supporting every step of the way.
What do you think was the most important occurrence for the industry in 2016? As with much of the past five years, the
increasing regulatory requirements for online gambling has been the most important shaping of the industry. The fact that most European countries have either now passed a regulatory regime, or plan to do so in the next two years, is a massive move and will change the maturity of the industry. We’re also seeing regulation in South and Central America and increasing talk
What are you most excited about for the industry in 2017? I think most people are somewhat fearful about 2017, as there are lots of question marks around the economic landscape, increased regulation and higher taxes. However, there still seems to be a lot of growth in the online sector and I still think it’s a great industry in which to be operating. Right across the world, it is rare to work in a sector with consistent double digit growth for so many years.
What are you most excited about for your own company in 2017? For Bede, the delivery to several clients of solutions that join up their digital and retail offerings is very exciting and will drive above- market growth for those companies. We also have some major projects to deliver to Tier One clients that we can’t reveal quite yet, but we are confident they will be game-changers. We are growing very rapidly and it is an
about Africa and some parts of Asia. Of course, this has driven massive consolidation in the industry, but looking at the macro view, the regulatory landscape changes are more important than the frenzy of M&A.
exciting time to be able to offer a modern, flexible platform to operators who are fed up with their current providers.
Anything else you’d like to say about the passing of 2016 and 2017’s arrival? My New Year wish is that gaming regulators
work together to create a single regime for operators and providers, rather than having to customise delivery to each territory. It doesn’t make a lot of sense for the big companies in the sector to have 40 different iterations of their offering, each one slightly different for each country they are delivering to. My advice to operators in 2017 would be that with the increasing burden of higher taxes and the cost of regulation, they need to make their businesses more efficient and effective. It is staggering in 2016 how many Tier 1 businesses still don’t have automated access to real-time data on their players and operations. It is encouraging to see that across the sectors there is an increasing realisation that future value comes from putting a digital platform at the centre of their operation, that is open, scalable, channel agnostic, and that supports real-time events. These principles are at the core of Bede Hub’s platform.
66 FEBRUARY 2017
Leigh Prather/Adobe Stock
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