iGaming Business (iGB) has launched a new site to help those wanting more information on the various jurisdictions around the world. iGaming Licenses will offer the end user a source of information on licenses from a number of different jurisdictions.
According to today’s release, the site will initially place emphasis on the “nine largest jurisdictions”. It lists these as Alderney, Antigua, Costa Rica, Curacao, Gibraltar, Isle of Man, Jersey, Kahnawake and Malta. Each jurisdiction will benefit from an introductory piece as well as a video presentation, basic license information and contact details.
Their list of nine doesn’t include the quintessential destinations that companies in the online gambling industry cannot do without – the UK and Philippines. These two are the top hubs for the online gambling business and the biggest players in the industry will try to get licenses in both jurisdictions. At the moment, only one company – Bodog – has a license in both places, though the entire industry is working on strategies to follow their lead. Clearly this is very difficult for the European Public companies though as they have a difficult time structuring to get into markets in Asia.
The iGaming Licenses site may be a help to those small under-financed and inexperienced operators who are looking to make their first strides into the industry. However, there are already some sites out there that do this and anyone under financed and inexperienced is unlikely to succeed in today’s online gaming world given the huge rise in barriers to entry over the last two decades. Most of the established firms or well financed and experienced start-ups will already have access to all this information and so will not need this.
Note: Costa Rica should not be on this list. It does not have licensing and is one of a large number of countries, including the US, that you can legally put some parts of an online gaming operation as long as you structure it correctly and do not have the entire business there. Costa Rica should be on a list of these types of Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) countries not on a list of licensing jurisdictions.
