GMB - Oddsgate was born a few months ago with the proposal to be the first Portuguese software house dedicated to iGaming. How to achieve this goal in the face of an increasingly fierce competition in this segment?
Paulo Lopes - We are aware that Portugal is increasingly becoming a country of reference in information technology. There are several unicorns valued above 1 billion dollars, such as Farfetch, OutSystems and Talkdesk that in recent years have been making their way here only within the reach of larger countries. We believe that the country has proven to be a valuable European tech hub, where the language, climate and privileged time zone allow connecting South America to Asia, with a level of expertise similar to what is best done in Silicon Valley. We also noticed that several companies in our online gambling and betting industry already have commercial or back office operations in Portugal, in addition to more than a dozen sites (operators) that already operate in the Portuguese legalized market, but there was truly a lack of reference company that centralized all its operations in Portugal, with a value proposition based on “next Gen” and innovation. That's Oddsgate's mission.
Where does all the technology developed by Oddsgate come from and how to offer a reliable, agile and easy-to-integrate platform to welcome the main developers of the global gaming market?
All the components that make up the novagate core, Oddsgate's proprietary platform, were developed from scratch by our IT team, which currently has more than 10 professionals and is growing every week. The company currently has 15 professionals and we expect to recruit another 35 by the end of 2022. Our confidence in the stability of the system stems from the 15 years of experience we already have in this industry, where we understand what are the key points of the technology that exists in the market and how we could present a new and evolving solution that allows operators to offer bets and games for the new generation of bettors. Among many other things, we have dedicated many months of our work to developing a seamless and easily scalable wallet, allowing our operators to integrate new options in an intuitive and fast way.
We are confident that our technical and operational approach will quickly create value and create a positive impact on the legal Brazilian online gambling market.
Is the metaverse still just a concept for Oddsgate or a reality ready to create a differentiated user experience? Could you talk more about the possibilities that the global iGaming industry will be able to offer with metaverse-based solutions?
I think we all feel that 2021 and 2022 were years of strong growth in NFTs, specifically in the area of collectibles and digital art. Although in the online gambling and betting industry there is still a long way to go, it will be a matter of a few years before there is a more hybrid and immersive reality, through games, glasses and headphones. This is what we are developing and where we will continue to invest as an integral part of our roadmap.
We want our operators to offer a truly digital and integrated solution, where the barriers between the real and the digital will be smaller and smaller, offering open wallet protocols that will allow the use of cash-back bonuses in the new marketplaces. We believe that the perfect marriage between the current digital and the web 4.0 will be made through eSports, which shows that it has the audience with the greatest growth potential in almost all the countries where we are collecting information. That is why we want to offer our operators a turnkey solution that allows them to start monetizing these audiences today and progressively begin to present the digital products that will be presented at specialized conferences in the coming quarters, such as ICE London.
Are Oddsgate solutions modular? Can customers choose the features, products and services customized for each market?
Although we are developing fully modular products, we prefer to offer our customers a turnkey package at this stage. There is currently a chronic lack of quality offer, and in the long conversations I had with operators that operate in the Brazilian market, I realized that it is urgent to present a “packaged” product that allows for fast and scalable monetization of current and future audiences that everday are being converted to eSports and Metaverse and therefore, we intend to provide only the closed solution by the end of 2022. We realize that there are several solutions that are born from an existing B2C that then seeks to carry out its localization process in Brazil, starting with the translation of the language and later integrating the methods of local options.
At Oddsgate we have created a different development process. Our business was born in the middle of a pandemic, without any adaptation of an old or non-standard technology to today's technological protocols. Our sprints are made in 360 degrees thinking only about the quality of delivery that our operator needs, in the shortest possible time, without “repatch” or “downtimes”.
Who are Oddsgate's main partners today, including game providers, operators, payment methods and data systems?
The company was founded in October 2021 and in the last 4 months we have only dedicated ourselves to doing what we do best, creating a unique technological product that can make the biggest operators in Brazil fall in love. We talked to dozens of betting site owners and questioned the market about the main problems in the relationship with their current platforms and converted these conclusions into business opportunities, through code and technology. Despite this, we have already entered into partnerships with important companies in the sector, namely in the area of Data & Integrity and Means of Payment. We currently have the PIX integrated, which seems to us to be absolutely essential to be able to operate in Brazil and more than 150 integrated casino games, hoping to quintuple this number by the end of the second quarter of 2022.
Are cryptocurrencies the new frontier for the iGaming industry? How to offer security and reliability in the face of so many virtual currency options?
I myself was a crypto-skeptic and had to do my apprenticeship. I was convinced by a group of people in our team who mastered the blockchain and explained to me all the potential for applying the technology in the online bBetting market. The issue of security seems very relevant to us and we are working our way with leading companies in the Exchange sector, so that we can offer these solutions to operators who choose to facilitate deposits and withdrawals to their users in BTC, USDT and others.
Volatility certainly creates challenges, especially in a market like Brazil, which since the 1990s has managed to solve a chronic problem, with great success. We believe that digital assets will have a relative impact on the Brazilian gaming market, similar to the commodities boom, which helped the country so much in the first decade of the 2000s. We have recently integrated a specialist Exchange in the gaming area, which will be able to offer Oddsgate operators a quick and easy to understand conversion to FIAT in dollars, thus minimizing operational risk.
What are the main markets that the company intends to reach?
We hope to operate on a global scale, but Brazil will certainly be one of the most important markets. However, the certification of our systems has already started in several jurisdictions and we believe that this will create enormous value, humbly bringing new ideas and practices to a market of enormous value, such as Brazil.
You have already stated that Brazil is one of the main focuses of the company. Is the reason just the language or is it the great potential that the country offers in the area of sports betting
Cultural affinity is an extremely important factor and in several meetings we have had with important media groups in South America, we have noticed that it is one of the major factors of instability in the relationship between systems and operators. The tropicalization of the offer is not only essential, but also the “match” between personalities, attitudes and values seems to be something that the industry can work better. We believe in a total partnership system, which joins forces to add value and thereby help our customers to offer a reliable service that is a source of pride.
Brazil has more than 450 sportbooks, which also offer casino games, eSports, live casino and virtual sports. What analysis do you make of this market?
It is certainly a sign of the enormous value and potential of the market. We believe that the Brazilian consumer shows a huge passion for traditional sports such as football, volleyball and MMA, but increasingly for the new eSports and that their demand will increase in the coming years.
Technology will play an essential role in keeping these expectations aligned, with business growth without ideological and technological friction. The consolidation of the market will come, not only through legalization, but also through the entry of new players that will bring a huge investment in marketing. It is essential that local operators take advantage of the time and momentum they still have, to draw up truly structuring plans that allow them to maintain and increase their market share. The retention of the Brazilian user will be done by the innovation and reliability of the product. We believe that technology can play a key role in creating relationships of trust.
Do you intend to install a unit in Brazil to be closer to a market that emerges as one of the largest in the world when all gaming modalities are approved?
No doubt. In the coming months, we will hire a resource that will allow us not only to increase our presence in Brazil, but also to follow the latest trends in innovation and development that are rapidly emerging in all 26 Brazilian states. Partnerships with eSports teams, industry publications and local colleges are high on our priority list.
Do you believe in a quick and complete legalization of the gaming sector in Brazil?
We believe that regulation will be quick and we intend to contribute as manufacturers and specialists of the high quality technology that will be the engine for the emergence of new operators that will operate in the Brazilian legal market. Our experience in the Portuguese regulatory process can bring some perspective to this debate and operationalization and we want to contribute with technical solutions of great value.
Source: Exclusive GMB
