When an iGaming operator looks at a market expansion, it usually goes one of two ways – either the move becomes profitable or it creates a level of unnecessary complexity.
How to avoid the latter became the main talking point in a discussion between Sergey Kastukevich, Chief Technology Officer at SOFTSWISS, and Nick Dvas, Chief Operations and Product Officer at iGaming infrastructure provider Servers.com.
Both C-level executives met at last month’s Tech Race Summit by SOFTSWISS, resulting in a conversation that produced takeaways about market expansion and the way of thinking that operators should adopt when looking to grow internationally.
The first question on the agenda was what should companies solve before even entering a new market. For Kastukevich and Dvas, regulation should be one of the key drivers behind the decision.
Dvas said: “Some jurisdictions require data to remain within their borders, which means the operator needs geographically distributed infrastructure. At the same time, different markets can impose incompatible requirements around data protection, storage and retention.
“Sports betting illustrates the challenge particularly well. The system has to be distributed enough to provide a competitive user experience, but coordinated enough to avoid opportunities created by timing differences between locations. If odds are updated at slightly different moments, geographical distribution can create arbitrage opportunities.”
Kastukevich added that every operator devising a new market-entry strategy should incorporate an infrastructure plan from the start. If this becomes an afterthought, the business risks each new jurisdiction adding an additional data environment and operational process.
“The goal is not simply to deploy locally. It is to expand while keeping the platform manageable and the customer experience consistent.”
For some, the question hangs around what could be a reliable solution to lean on when looking at simplifying the technology infrastructure across international operations.
Cloud technology has been the obvious answer for most of the last decade, but that is also starting to change thanks to the digital advancements of today
“Cloud remains an important enabler, but it can also amplify costs,” Dvas said.
“AI has dramatically increased the amount of data being generated, processed and retrieved. As a result, storage, computation and data transfer can become extremely expensive in the cloud.”
It is now not down to whether to use the cloud at all, but leveraging its flexibility to integrate it across the exact areas of your business it can benefit the most.
This essentially is one of the most important technical and financial decisions for operators, Dvas added, that can make or break a new market entry.
Looking ahead towards the end of this decade, both experts agreed that iGaming companies will be looking at a fundamentally different optimisation process for their infrastructures.
Perhaps the most glaring difference will be that operations will become fully AI-native, supporting enhanced networking, storage and processing capabilities that allow for exponential levels of growth in a short period of time.
This, of course, will need to be balanced with financial resilience and smart economic decisions-making.
Additionally, a modular architecture, Dvas noted, will help to address stricter regulatory regimes – therefore turning from a competitive advantage to a basic requirement.
Lastly, bridging the gap between gambling and technology will become even more crucial for success, which is the high value that events like the Tech Race Summit can offer.
Kastukevich concluded: “That is the purpose of the Tech Race. The industry already has many forums for discussing commercial growth. We wanted to create a space where people could examine the technology that makes that growth possible — and the decisions that determine whether it remains sustainable.”