GMB - How did your previous experience at FanDuel influence the creation of BetDEX?
Varun Sudhakar - While working at FanDuel, I saw how massive the market was even though it was rife with poor user experiences. High fees north of 10%, discriminatory practices like stake limiting or premium charging winners, and counterparty risk with operators disappearing with your funds in pre-regulated markets were not exceptions, but industry norms. We wanted to create a fair, transparent and even playing field that did not discriminate against smart bettors, and that’s why we started BetDEX.
Why did you decide to create a betting exchange rather than a traditional bookmaker for BetDEX?
Sports betting exchanges, by their peer to peer nature, facilitate an environment that leads to lower fees and better user experience for everyone. As an exchange we are not the counterparty to wagers on our platform, but rather provide the rails to connect a buyer and a seller (or a backer and a layer). Users are able to bet on a team, or alternatively provide liquidity and express a view by dictating at what price they are willing to take a particular bet.
By being a pure exchange, our incentives are aligned with our users as we don’t bet against them, rather we are just trying to bring as many users as we can to the platform to create liquid betting markets.This allows us to charge a much smaller commission rate to users compared to industry standards, and puts the power back into the hands of the users.
What is the role of the Monaco Protocol in the structure of BetDEX, and how does it differ from traditional operators?
The Monaco Protocol is a decentralized liquidity network for sport betting platforms. It consists of an on-chain matching algorithm and orderbook, which is fully open-sourced and permissionless. This powers operators such as the BetDEX Exchange. The protocol offers numerous benefits to operators including open access, pooled liquidity, and transparency.
This allows BetDEX to offer a product unique from anything else on the market, giving the users a sports betting product they are familiar with, yet with all the added transparency and security of being built on an open-sourced protocol, with the benefits of liquid markets with tight spread and great prices Builders and developers just need to concentrate on building the best product / front-end possible to bring users into the ecosystem, they don’t need to worry about how to bootstrap the ecosystem or building the back-end as they can take advantage of the existing liquidity and open-sourced nature of the Monaco Protocol.
How does decentralization contribute to the low commission costs at BetDEX?
Incentive misalignment and lack of trust is prevalent in sports betting. Operators make money off their users losing, leagues and data companies make copious amounts of money by forcing operators to use ‘official’ data, sharper bettors are often banned on betting platforms, platforms can make it difficult for you to withdraw your money…the list goes on.
In an environment where trust is at an all-time low and power is concentrated amongst the few, decentralisation can flip this on its head; it can create an ecosystem with aligned incentives where participants own a part of an ecosystem and get compensated commensurate with their contributions to the ecosystem.
Imagine a world where liquidity providers, users, data feed providers, and front-end operators are all incentivized to contribute to the Monaco Protocol, and are compensated appropriately for it. This will lead lead to lower fees as the ecosystem becomes more and more liquid as additional market participants (e.g. users, operators, liquidity providers, etc.) onboard.
Why did you choose the Solana network as the basis for BetDEX's infrastructure, and how does this choice affect transaction speed?
For any exchange to succeed, low fees and high throughput are basic necessities. We evaluated many different blockchains, and Solana was the clear winner on these metrics.. By building on the Solana blockchain, BetDEX can deliver high speeds and low transaction costs to its users.
How is BetDEX's technology being adapted for the Brazilian market, and what are your expectations for expansion in this country?
The Brazilian market will undoubtedly be a key market for BetDEX. Our exchange offers many markets around popular Brazilian leagues & cups, including Serie A and Copa Libertadores. As BetDEX continues to grow, we are always looking to add more sports, leagues, and markets and will continue to increase our coverage around Brazil. Additionally, we will soon be translating our exchange into Portuguese, for those that prefer to browse and bet in languages other than English.
What are BetDEX's future plans in terms of growth and technological innovation?
BetDEX has a comprehensive roadmap of product improvements and features coming over the next year, starting with increasing the number of markets available to bet on, and increasing liquidity on those markets. In the immediate future, we will also be adding new ways to deposit and withdraw on BetDEX, making that experience as easy as ever. Going forward, BetDEX will continue to strive to improve the betting experience for its users to create a faster, better way to bet on sports with no restrictions.
How does BetDEX view the role of decentralized protocols in the future of the iGaming industry?
Decentralised protocols will be a significant part of the future of sports betting, as more power shifts back from the operator to the end user. These protocols will serve as the infrastructure needed to power exchange-based applications, allowing operators to focus on incredible user experiences rather than paying for access to traditional black-box iGaming platforms. Truly a win-win for both operator and users.
Source: Exclusive GMB
