The many states and provinces of North America are a lucrative gold mine but also a regulatory maze for gambling companies to navigate, whether these be operators or suppliers.
Providing the perspective of the latter in a discussion with SBC Media at ICE earlier this year, Michael Bauer, the CFO and CGO at gaming content developer Greentube, explained how the company is approaching the US and Canada.
The company has secured market launch in some of the US’ most prominent regulated markets, such as Michigan, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Central to this has of course been its partnerships with some of the country’s biggest operators.
“It’s a really interesting aspect, forming long-term partnerships especially with the big operators in the US,” says Bauer. “What we try to do first is understand what the player base is of the operator, from operator to operator.
“It differs a bit from operator to operator, some are more higher roller focused some are not, some are more casino first some are sportsbook first – it makes a difference in the player base, that’s step one to understand what players they have.
“Secondly when we look at our portfolio of games and what we have in the pipeline, we select them for the player base we have. What we try to do is have marketing campaigns together to try and formulate a marketing campaign so it hits the nerve with the player base.”
Greentube’s extensive experience of both the US and European gaming markets has taught the company a lot about how to manage partnerships from operator-to-operator, as Bauer explained.
Creating bespoke games to suit the needs of different operators’ customer bases forms part of this, he adds, while feedback from partner companies themselves helps inform what mechanics and themes are most appropriate for their users.
This experience has also come in handy north of the border in the Canadian gaming sector, though the landscape here is of course very different to that of its US counterpart. For one thing, only Ontario has a multi-licence regulated market, while in the other provinces, the state-backed lottery firms are the only gaming providers.
Greentube has been able to secure ‘some of the biggest partners’ in Ontario, Bauer says, and the firm is ‘actively working’ with the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG). It has already gone live with provincial lotteries in British Columbia and Quebec, he adds, and now wants ‘to achieve the same thing in Ontario’.
“Ontario is indeed a very interesting market for us, and because it’s kind of a mixture of Europe and US we see a mix of games working there that are Europe and US style. This is good for us because we have both.”
“Canada in general works really well for us, whatever new province comes next we want to get a licence with,” he adds on Greentube’s wider Canadian prospects, saying that ‘Alberta is on the top of our list’ as the firm, along with others, eagerly awaits a potential gaming launch in the province.
