These two years of pandemic, especially due to all the sanitary restrictions, have driven up the growth of online gaming —casino, sports betting, virtuals sports, esports and lotteries— and online payment methods too. Unlike other regions, these sectors were not very mature in Latin America. In an exclusive interview with Georges Didier, Gaming Laboratories International (GLI)‘s Latin America Government Relations and Business Development Representative, Yogonet asked if this was reflected in the type of inquiries that GLI has received during this period of time, and what kind of changes GLI has implemented in its services and products in order to be alined with the market’s needs.
“It could be said that the crisis was the main driver of online gambling in the region. During these two years, gaming regulators were concerned about understanding more about online gambling, updating their regulations allowing to expand the offer of games, establishing regulations, and advancing in bills that ultimately became official regulations,” Didier explains.
GLI has always worked with gaming regulators, lotteries, providers and operators, helping and guiding them to achieve their goals and face their new challenges. “As part of the process of adapting to the much mentioned ‘new reality’, we have, for example, successfully carried out remote trainings through our new e-learning platform and the processes between our different locations have also been perfected to ensure quality in the certification service.”
In addition, Didier notes that security evaluation services have been a highly required item by manufacturers. “They must ensure the transactions carried out on their websites and must provide security and protection to critical information of the players and the organization.”
Regarding industry events, Didier believes that collaboration is key for the industry, “and remote events where one of the key opportunities we had to stay connected and continue to share our experience and learn from our peers. Although we have participated in some face-to-face events during 2021, we hope that by 2022 all activities will resume as normal.”
Furthermore, the pandemic saw players gradually begin to lose their fear of making transactions over the internet, using the different methods that gambling operators have been implementing and offering on their game pages and applications, Didier tells Yogonet.
“On the other hand, it is important to mention that the development and use of cashless technology and its different variants has grown a lot in the industry, thus favoring the growth of the gaming industry. An important point to consider is that to ensure the integrity of the communications and security of the transactions with the different payment methods, it is imperative to carry out the respective integration tests between the different payment methods and the operators’ platforms,” GLI’s executive underlines.
“Regulations continue to be challenged with the need of continuous change and we are happy to be part of this process. We do hope that we see a faster advance to real omnichannel operations in 2022, so both landbase and online gaming creates a safe and attractive offer to the players of today,” Didier concludes.