In this interview with CalvinAyre.com’s Rebecca Liggero, NetEnt managing director Bjorn Krantz discusses the European company’s foray into the North American market via New Jersey.
European company Net Entertainment is expanding its footprint in the North American market, starting with New Jersey.
Bjorn Krantz, managing director of NetEnt North America, said the process to get into New Jersey has been a long one—dating back to 2013—but it was worth the wait.
“We’ve been scouting around in the U.S. and North America for quite some time, attending seminars, conferences, so forth and so on, and learn what the market is about then and yeah, what is happening. And we felt that even if the New Jersey market opened up by November 2013, we felt the time was not right, but one year back we took a decision that now is the time to do something in North America, starting with the license process in New Jersey,” Krantz told CalvinAyre.com. “NetEnt is a big company in Europe and we want to expand our footprint. We felt that North America is the right place to be.”
Between 2013 and 2015—when NetEnt received its transactional waiver from the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement—not much has happened in the regulated American market. Plus, NetEnt is a European company, and U.S. has a reputation of being reluctant to have international companies coming in and doing work in its markets.
“All in all, it has been a very positive experience for us. We’re used to working in regulated environments and we’re licensed in Europe and we’ve been able to take that experience and knowledge when we applied for the license in New Jersey. And looking at the attitude to NetEnt being a, let’s say, more of a European company, that has never been a problem,” Krantz explained. “We’ve all been, as I said, scouting around in north America and US for quite some time so we’ve been able to build a good top of mind. We are known to be a pioneer in what we’re doing in the online casino segment. We’re also known to have premium content with the best quality and innovation around it, so actually the buzz around NetEnt coming into U.S. has been fantastic and we can’t wait to be live.”
Krantz believed NetEnt’s foray into the U.S. will help the American online gambling market, which, to be honest, is still green and new.
“Through the 20 years that we’ve been live, we have gathered a lot of business intelligence. And business intelligence is important because it’s about data, facts, how to help our partners to optimize their operations,” Krantz said. “I think you know that we can take a good piece of that business intelligence and help our partners in U.S., starting with New Jersey as we build up their business momentum over the NetEnt content.”
