The smart people that accommodate some swathes of the gambling industry have already identified that Asia is the place to be right now and where the major growth is taking place. Asia’s market, whether it is land-based or online, continues to grow at some pace. Right now, the unprecedented growth being seen on that continent is without equal. There will come a time when new avenues need to be explored and one continent that is relatively untouched in that sense is Antarctica.
We joke.
The emerging market that has yet to be exploited is Africa and with one billion people living on the continent, it won’t be long until we see some movement on that front. With electricity at a premium and a lack of broadband penetration present, then there’s only really one way that the gambling industry can hope to expand onto the continent and that’s by using the continent’s mobile networks.
Africa is seeing growth in the area of mobile devices like never before. An article in the Observer cites that in 1998, only four million of Africa’s population even had a phone at their disposal. In 2011, that number has ballooned so that now roughly half (500 million) own one. Uganda alone has 10m (30% of the population) and for a country that has seen large upheaval in the last few decades, that’s an impressive figure.
Back in May at eGR Live, Matt Jellicoe of OffsideGaming spoke of his belief that Africa could be huge and said that Forex on the continent was “growing massively.”
In terms of where the online gambling industry has already made strides on the continent, you only have to look at figures coming out of South Africa. One of Africa’s most developed countries saw online gaming on the increase earlier this year and the country is now seriously looking at adopting their own online gambling industry regulations.
If the mobile penetration is anything to go by then it may only be a matter of time until we start to see mobile gambling industry firms seriously looking at the continent for their next port of call. Then it really will only be the continent of Antartica left to exploit. Our tip: go to the Ice Bar in preparation.
