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Mark Chakravarti is the Investment Director at SportingWin. He talks about how SportingWin’s experience in securing a license in Bulgaria, and how it will use its own regulatory platform to expand into other European markets.
A proprietary regulatory platform is essential for European market expansion. Licence applications can be delayed for months or even years without a modern and agile platform that gives regulators the information they need.
SportingWin learned this lesson the hard way.
We identified Bulgaria as a market with huge potential when we founded the company in 2019. Our assessment showed that AGR would reach 20% per year over the next five-years, leading to a market worth EUR500m each year.
The next step was to compile the legal documentation required by the National Revenue Agency in order to apply for a licence. This was a difficult task, but it was only the beginning.
The Bulgarian regulator is considered one of the most strict in the world. This is a good thing. It ensures that operators who are approved to enter the market have the highest quality, especially in responsible gambling.
It requires operators to be able deliver certain insights and information in real-time to regulators. This is why a strong, flexible regulatory platform is essential. We ultimately decided to develop this technology internally.
This was the right decision, but it caused significant delays in our application for a licence. The regulator and our internal development team worked together to make sure that the process was compliant with their requirements.
The National Revenue Agency was satisfied with our paperwork and our reg-tech platform. We were then allowed to enter the market in January 2021. We have seen incredible growth in players since then.
We are looking to expand SportingWin’s presence in other markets, as well as our own regulatory platform. It is truly impressive, and it can now be used anywhere else.
We have identified Romanian as our next market. While we have not yet submitted our application to regulators, our proprietary regulatory platform will make it a much simpler and quicker process than in Bulgaria.
There are many reasons for this. Because the National Revenue Agency is so strict with its standards and enforces them, other jurisdictions will approve our platform without putting it through the same scrutiny.
This is true for a lot the paperwork we submitted as part of our application to Bulgaria. For example, the Romanian regulator will gladly transfer this along with the technical and software certificates that were granted to us.
Local regulators will continue to investigate and test our tech and software. However, much of the work has been done already and we will be able to expand quickly into additional markets. We expect to be live in Romania in H1.
Operators will need a European trademark to protect their brand/brands. This is in addition to an internal regulatory platform, approved paperwork, and the experience gained from submitting a license application.
SportingWin has recently been granted this license. It allows us to enter European regulated markets with a strong brand, superior product offering, and an effective regulatory platform.
SportingWin is a great investment opportunity for investors who want to be part of our success story. Because of the technical foundations in place, we can invest in marketing our brand in each country which allows us to quickly generate significant share.
We have been in Bulgaria only one year. Despite this, we have a loyal player base. In Q4, we generated EUR500,000 in NGR. We are excited to announce a partnership with Pinnacle that will allow us to offer a betting exchange.
SportingWin, like most small- to medium-sized operators has a long term plan. It is designed to make SportingWin an attractive acquisition opportunity for a power player looking to expand their presence in Europe’s regulated markets.
SportingWin, without our European trademark, proprietary regulator platform and growing collection licences, would not even be considered serious M&A opportunities.
There is much more to be done before we can reach the next chapter, but SportingWin founders have sold and built betting businesses before so I feel confident that we will get there in no time.
We will use our regulatory platform to continue to launch our player-favourite brands and superior betting experiences into European markets. This will generate substantial revenues for each jurisdiction we target.
