According to an official of the provincial lottery corporation, the Ontario market would be “number one” in the world in terms revenue if the IGaming Ontario combined with the OLG numbers.
Andrew Darley made this claim at SBC Summit North America during a session focusing on Ontario. He explained that OLG figures are confidential, but substantial enough for the largest global markets.
He said: “I cannot give you the exact number, but I can tell you that we’ve continued to grow. If you add up our numbers with the iGO figures, I’d say we are the largest market in the entire world.
“I think that’s important to understand the importance of having both the provincially-regulated group and the operators from all over the world.”
iGaming Ontario revealed last month that commercial players in the province generated over $35bn of revenue in its first year. This puts it among the top five markets for North America in this particular metric.
Marina Bogard is the MD for North America of Betsson, and Geoff Zochodne is a sports betting journalist at Covers.
Zochodne who covers the industry at Covers noted that US audience may have underestimated Ontario’s strength, considering OLG numbers were confidential and therefore not included in public announcements.
He said: “When iGO released the annual figures, it was met with a lot of shrugs, mostly south of the Canadian Border, because they didn’t include OLG data.
“I thought there was a miscommunication; the operation has been really strong since 2015. “I feel that OLG is a much larger market when it’s added to the competition.”
Dave Phillips thanked his panelists for being so warm and welcoming after a year in the market.
Phillips explained that because operators were heavily involved in developing the regulations, they are more likely than not to comply with the framework.
The COO at AGCO said that effective regulation is built on real communication. He added: “Good policy can only be improved by real, two-way communications.” We conducted five rounds of consultation and (took into account) the experiences of other jurisdictions around the world.
“We have also implemented a targeted strategy to deal with unregulated markets. We have 45 operators, and twice as much in suppliers. “The level of interdependency between us is massive.”
The panelists on the operator’s side all agreed that the communication was effective and created a market where fairness is at its heart.
Bruce Caughill cites the provincial ban on advertising bonus as a key example. Former AGCO employee and Canadian lead of RSI, Bruce Caughill, said that the ban on advertising bonuses in the province has forced operators into focusing on a good product.
Caughill said, “It has forced us to all market our products and offerings.” As everyone has said, this is a level playing ground. As we move forward I’d like to say that I believe, the interpretation of this restriction is very important because I do really think it’s important to continue allowing operators to market their product.”
The panel then discussed the future of the market. Ontario was revealed to be the major battleground, with more than 40 operators and over 76 websites/apps.
Burns asked if the competition and innovation could be sustained over the medium-to-long-term with so many operators competing for attention and market share.
Bogard’s answer was straightforward.
Bogard said to the panel: “I don’t believe it’s sustainable. It will become a consolidate at some point.”
It’s very difficult to make money if your only product is a sportsbook. You need to offer multiple products, such as casino, to be profitable.
When you look at the US Market, it will start to consolidate. We’re already starting to see some drop off completely. The top three or four will remain, but the others are likely to be acquired or go out of business.
Coolbet became the first operator in Ontario to exit its market as it approached a year of operations. Switching off before the end March, Coolbet left the Ontario market for the first time.
