As the pace of U.S. sports betting expansion slows, suppliers are increasingly looking beyond domestic borders to fuel growth.
SBC Americas sat down with IGT PlaySports to explore how the company is adapting its strategy to stay competitive in the global market, while maintaining a strong North American focus.
Zee Khan, Director of Sales, shares how the group is evolving its offering to meet international standards and catering to diverse player preferences across emerging markets.
SBC Americas: To begin, could you just give us an interpretation of where you think PlaySports currently sits within the sports betting landscape?
Zee Khan: I would consider us the leader in North America, especially in the tribal communities and the different jurisdictions within the tribal environment. I don’t think there’s another tech provider that is as prevalent as IGT PlaySports right now.
We’re in 33 different jurisdictions. We lead the market in Washington, where I think we have nine tribal customers there, similar to Wisconsin. From a tribal perspective, we are definitely the leader in the market.
From an overall perspective, we have commercial relationships with some of the larger operators. From an overall North America US perspective, we probably considered ourselves the leader in this space right now.
SBCA: What do you see as the major headwinds currently holding back either the sector as a whole, or yourselves more specifically?
ZK: With the legislation being slow to move when it comes to new jurisdictions coming online, we’re all in the same place, including our competitors, trying to figure out where those opportunities are.
They mainly exist in customer relationships, maintaining our existing customer base and monitoring expired contracts that may or may not be out there. We’re all in the same boat, chasing the same business.
It’s just a matter of slow expansion, and building relationships in the jurisdiction that we think may be coming online.
Overall, we’re heavily focused on the service that we’re providing our existing customers, and maintaining that base and those relationships to keep positive growth within those.
SBCA: Within regards to that slowdown that you mentioned, do you envisage that changing any time soon? And how do you kind of go about preparing for that beforehand to hit the ground running immediately?
ZK: There’s always new legislation that’s being tossed around. You hear about bills being proposed, whether or not they gain the proper support or not is another issue.
In doing that, and tracking those roadmaps where we are actively trying to get into those potentially new jurisdictions at the very least, you need to build those relations in the event that it does happen.
It’s no secret that our competitors are doing the same thing. Actively we should be doing it. All of us should be doing it.
At the end of the day, there will be new legislation at some point. It’s just a matter of how soon it happens. You see states like Minnesota and Oklahoma potentially presenting new legislation.
Those are tribal based states where the tribes have a pretty big voice on what that legislation looks like, and protecting themselves in that sense.
The good thing with our operation is that we do have an extensive tribal base. We understand the intricacies of what goes on in those states as they come online, and then we also have the benefit of IGT as a whole from the gaming side where we’ve had these land-based relationships in these states for decades.
We do have a little bit on the ground as far as what may or may not be happening, but those relationships already exist, which is nice. We can get in these and use our land-based teams to really help us build on those relationships. We have a little bit of an ear on the ground in that sense. It’s good to have those relationships and just to continue to build on those.
SBCA: Has this slowdown helped to fuel ambitions for international growth? How much will your US foundation serve as a springboard for this expansion?
ZK: I would say yes and no. The one thing that we want to do is maintain our core focus. Our core focus remains heavily on North America. To the point about legislation slowing down, everybody’s going around trying to figure out what that next phase of opportunity looks like.
We did a rather large deal with Caliente for all of their retail sportsbooks in Mexico, and using that as a platform essentially to expand downward into Latin America is the next goal of that relationship.
Caliente has a footprint of nearly 150 casino properties throughout Mexico and Latin America, going downward into Argentina, Peru and Uruguay.
That relationship that we built in Mexico is rolling out the first phase of that now, and will really help our expansion downward. From a strategic perspective, our goal wasn’t aligned with anything international. I just think it’s the nature of the business taking us that way, versus a true focused strategic move to go downward into Latin America.
If an opportunity presents itself elsewhere, we’d obviously look at it from an operational standpoint. The biggest thing that we provide is the service to our customers. We want to maintain that level of service as we grow.
SBCA: You’ve mentioned your North American roots, and the potential of moving south. What lessons, if any, can you take from those years of experience that have been gained within those regions where your roots are embedded to accelerate that path downwards?
ZK: We’re unique in the market in the sense that we have such an experienced team overall when it specifically comes to retail sports.
As we have grown our North American footprint, the one thing that we rely on the most is our experienced trading team that’s been in Nevada for 40 plus years. The experience that they bring in a unique environment like Nevada translates outward extremely well..
Once we’re expanding into these new territories, whether it be North America or Latin America, our guys have a wealth of knowledge.
From an operational perspective, we feel that we have the experience to be extremely competitive as we expand in these markets, and provide a service that they haven’t had from a trading perspective. It really helps separate us when we’re out there in the marketplace.
SBCA: We’re heading towards the end of the year, and it’d be remiss of me to not ask what the expectations and ambitions are for next year? What are you hoping to achieve?
ZK: Continued growth. One of our core focuses is to maintain our customer base and keep these existing customers happy from a service perspective.
We want to continue their growth. Each of our customers are unique and different in their own regard. They all have growth expectations as well, and we want to continue to partner alongside them and help them grow.
We’re building relationships with CRM operators, such as Xtremepush, bringing them into the fold to expand customer retention.
We’re looking at doing more traditional and digital marketing with our customers. Expanding our offering and ability to coexist with our customers as we both grow together. That’s one of the main things we’re focused on for next year.
Growth is obviously the objective. We’re looking at expanding our relationship with Caliente. Like I said, we’re in our phase one rollout. I think we’re almost done with 40+ properties in Mexico, and then that’ll continue into Latin America.
There could be new jurisdictions opening up legislation. We’re always on the lookout for that. Next it might be outwards up to Canada. There’s potentially some opportunities there.
Overall I think the biggest thing for us is to keep our core customers, and then keep an eye on things as contracts come up and expire. 2026 is potentially a big contract year for expirations.
SBCA: Keeping on the theme of 2026, what do you expect to be the major themes and talking points across the industry during the coming year?
ZK: Within the US we have the CFTC and Kalshi and Polymarket expanding and opening up some of these markets in a non-traditional way. It’s providing a unique environment for us to challenge ourselves and our partners to grow.
Alongside that with a lot of our tribal relationships, it’s a very touchy subject as far as what they are doing in some of these regulated states, but then also the unregulated states, such as California.
You have these Kalshi, Polymarket type of partners going into that territory and almost creating a head start in a sense. If California doesn’t legalise sports betting for another few years, they’re really getting a head start in those states.
From a tribal perspective that’s a little touchy. They’re looking at that as a negative opportunity for them to continue their own growth and potentially have their hand on the legislation that may or may not be coming down the pipeline.
It’s unique because you’re now seeing some of the major sports leagues partnering with Kalshi, such as the recently announced NHL partnership. While it’s potentially viewed as harmful to the legalised sports betting world, some of the more traditional sports partners are now taking it on.
It’ll be unique to see what happens there with the larger operators, but from our space, we’re pretty well protected and our tribal relationships are strong. Obviously, our goal is to continue those tribal relationships and do whatever we can do to keep that path growing.
