European Union
Exclusive Interview with Tiago Almeida (LATAM Gaming Specialists and CEO of eGamingServices)
It was great to catch up and start doing these short interviews once again. I look forward to having you all as readers of these short interviews and as guests of our “Morning Show” on iGamingRadio.com.
Today’s special interviewee is Tiago Almeida (CEO of eGamingServices). Tiago started his career in the online gaming industry in 2006. With a professional experience in leading companies like Bwin and Dragonfish, he was involved in different senior operational and marketing roles focused on the Latin American Market.
In 2016 Tiago founded eGamingServices a company with offices in Brazil, Uruguay, Malta and Portugal, that provides marketing and operational services to Online Gaming Operators willing to monetize opportunities in Latin America.
We’ve seen that you have been involved in the leadership of large brands and this makes us curious to learn more about the first days of eGamingServices. What was the main reason you have started to build such a service?
Tiago: eGamingServices arose in 2016, from the need of many gaming operators to get into new potential markets whose operation they did not know about.
In that sense, we help gaming operators around the world to redefine their product and find their customer online or within the retail channel on some of the regions with the most potential in the industry: Latin America, Europe and Africa.
Through our service and network, we can adapt their operation to demanding and competitive new markets, with a team of experts driving the operation.
You have a long-standing experience with Latin America countries and we are certain you can give an opinion about the market. How do you feel about the recent developments in terms of compliance and market regulation in the region?
Tiago: As a company, who has clients in the sport betting and gambling business, we want to have a law that regulates our industry in Latam. We believe that if the industry is re-organized could reap benefits to all parts.
We believe in LATAM as a region essential for the affiliates and operators. Profitability in LATAM is easy to achieve – with proper insight and cultural understanding. Also, opportunities are there and competition is still low. Latin America is one of the fastest growing regions of e-commerce in the world, only behind Asia-Pacific. It is estimated that by 2019, e-commerce in Latin America will generate sales of around US $ 85,000 million.
Right now, we have many projects in Brazil, which is the strongest country in LATAM, whose sales represent nearly 60% of Egamingservices operations in Latin America.
Coming back to Europe, where you have offices in Malta and Portugal, what are the main services you provide for operators in European regulated markets?
Tiago: We offer Strategic Consultancy because we understand the burden of an online gaming operator. In order to expand our clients activities, brands need to approach new markets to expand their income and mitigate risks related with the new regulated markets, such as .IT, .ES, .PT or .FR. For that reason, our services include: business planning, turnkey operation management, UI and UX design, CRM, a licensing services. We drive the car on behalf of the operator to allow our clients to focus on what is more important to them. Manage their business only from a bottom line perspective. As a company, we take care of the operational and marketing aspects, with a competitive Managed Services solution.
We study the compliance updates around market regulation in Europe and we have come to the conclusion that each of the emerging markets are always bettering the already in force laws of other countries. But, somehow these regulations are not always successful do to the nature of the market and due to sometimes over regulation. What is your opinion about emerging markets in the European Union?
Tiago: Currently the online gaming business is constantly growing. However, there are markets whose relevance is not being highlighted. In eGamingServices, we create a bridge between emerging markets and affiliates willing to monetize their traffic It is important to invest in this market that is growing every year.
We have reviewed your website and seen that you attend most of the industry events, what are your next stops in Q1 and Q2?
Tiago: We are extremely excited with 2018, as it is our second year as a company. We are attending a new record number of events, such as ICE, LAC, Betting on Sports, Brazilian Gaming Congress, SAGSE, SIGMA and many others. We truly believe in the Digital world, but face to face meetings with our clients, partners and affiliates are true business accelerators moments and we want to Streamline them.
Contact Information
Stephanie Coccoluto Pestana – eGamingServices
Press Relations & Communication Manager
[email protected]/ [email protected]
http://www.egamingservices.com
+351 916 229 594
About eGamingServices
Founded in 2016 and based in the Portuguese city of Lisbon, eGamingServices also has offices in Chile, Brazil, Malta and Uruguay. The company helps gaming operators to redefine their product and find their customer online or within the retail channel of some of the regions with the most potential in the industry: Latin America, Europe and Africa. eGamingServices creates effective and efficient projects to help operators find new customers and generate more income.
For more information, please visit our site or follow us on Linkedin.
Compliance Updates
THE EU AI ACT AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR THE IGAMING INDUSTRY
By: Danil Emelyanov, Head of AI Labs, Betby
First of all, the regulation of AI is inevitable. The EU was the first to step into this arena with the EU AI Act, setting a precedent that other parts of the world will likely follow. This proactive approach positions the EU as a leader in AI governance, but it also means that regions adopting similar regulations later might benefit from the lessons learned and adjustments made in response to early implementations.
The downside is that those who come last to the regulatory scene might indeed benefit the most. For instance, the competitive landscape in AI innovation currently favors new entrants in the US or UK over Europe, partly due to the stringent compliance requirements of the EU AI Act. This regulation could potentially affect the flow of investments into European AI ventures, making regions with more flexible or yet-to-be-defined regulations more attractive for AI start-ups and investors.
However, the positive aspect is the collaborative approach the EU has taken in drafting this legislation. It’s not a one-way mandate from legislators to businesses; rather, it involves dialogue and input from various stakeholders, including tech companies and open-source communities. Notably, there are exemptions for open-source AI models, likely influenced by contributions from French and German tech firms like Mistral and Aleph Alpha, which have been vocal about the importance of open-source innovation.
The AI Act predominantly focuses on regulating foundation models rather than classic machine learning models. The legislation sets a computational power threshold at 10^25 floating-point operations per second (FLOPS), below which AI systems are generally exempt from stringent regulations. This threshold implies that unless an organization is training a model on the scale of GPT-3.5 or larger, compliance concerns are minimal. This serves as a reminder of the value of simpler machine learning techniques like logistic regression and random forests, which can effectively solve business problems without the complexity and regulatory scrutiny of more advanced models.
For the iGaming industry, the implications of the EU AI Act are relatively manageable. Our legal teams will diligently study the law to ensure compliance, even if it means a slight reduction in the accuracy of our models. This cautious approach is necessary because the fines for non-compliance are substantial, ranging from 1.5% to 7% of global turnover, depending on the severity of the offense and the size of the company. Additionally, some aspects of the Act are vaguely defined, which could pose challenges in interpretation and application.
Despite these challenges, the iGaming sector should remain vigilant. Staying informed about regulatory updates and actively engaging with the regulatory process can help mitigate risks and ensure smooth compliance. The EU AI Act sets high standards for transparency, accountability, and ethical AI use, which, whilst demanding, also push the industry towards more responsible AI deployment.
Compliance Updates
EGBA Welcomes European Parliament’s Approval Of New EU Anti-Money Laundering Framework
The EU’s new anti-money laundering package aims to create a more consistent regulatory framework and will benefit online gambling operators by standardising AML rules and reporting requirements across member states.
Brussels, 24 April 2024 – The European Parliament has approved the EU’s new anti-money laundering (AML) package at its plenary sitting today, marking a significant milestone towards a new EU framework for combatting financial crime. The European Gaming and Betting Association (EGBA), representing Europe’s leading online gambling operators, welcomes the Parliament’s approval of the new AML package and believes the incoming rule changes will strengthen the EU’s approach to tackling money laundering.
The new package will contain:
- A single rulebook regulation – with provisions on conducting due diligence on customers, transparency of beneficial owners and the use of crypto-assets.
- The 6th Anti-Money Laundering Directive – containing national provisions on supervision and national AML authorities, as well as on the access of authorities to necessary and reliable information, e.g. beneficial ownership registers.
- The establishment of the European Anti-Money Laundering Authority (AMLA) – which have supervisory and investigative powers to ensure compliance with AML requirements, operating in conjunction with national AML authorities.
EGBA believes the new rules will benefit Europe’s online gambling operators by ensuring a consistent regulatory approach across EU member states. Another important feature, under the competence of AMLA, will be the creation of a harmonised reporting format for Suspicious Transaction Reports (STRs). This will ensure that Europe’s online gambling operators encounter the same STR requirements across all EU member states, thereby setting clear and consistent expectations that will reduce administrative burdens and costs.
To assist online gambling operators in complying with the EU’s new AML rules, EGBA has developed industry-specific guidelines on anti-money laundering which apply a risk-based approach and include practical measures that operators can take – on customer and business risk assessments, customer due diligence processes, suspicious transaction reporting, and record keeping. EGBA members already apply the guidelines and submit annual reports to EGBA that summarise their progress in implementing its measures. The guidelines are also open to all operators based in the EU and EGBA encourages operators to sign up to them.
The AML package now awaits formal adoption by the Council of the EU, expected in May, before being published in the EU’s Official Journal.
“We welcome the European Parliament’s approval of the new anti-money laundering package. The new framework will set high standards and ensure greater consistency in the application of AML rules across the EU. Online gambling operators, especially those operating in multiple countries, will benefit from a single rulebook and harmonised reporting requirements that will unravel national complexities. We will look to review our industry guidelines on AML to ensure their alignment with the new EU rules. By signing up to the guidelines, operators can already prepare themselves for the incoming changes in the EU rules and join our members in their efforts to proactively and positively contribute to the EU’s fight against money laundering.” – Dr. Ekaterina Hartmann, Director of Legal and Regulatory Affairs, EGBA.
Source: EGBA
Compliance Updates
European Union Updates Country List for Stricter AML Checks
The European Commission, the executive branch of the European Union (EU), has updated its list of high-risk countries, from which players should be subjected to stricter customer checks by gambling operators.
Based on Directive (EU) 2015/849, Article 9, the Commission identifies any high-risk third countries that have strategic deficiencies in their regime on anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism.
As such, operators based in the EU that are offering services to these countries or dealing with players from these nations are obliged to carry out heightened vigilance checks.
The list was first published in July 2016 and has been updated a number of times as further countries of concern are identified and flagged by the Commission.
The latest countries to be added to this list – in an update published last month – include Burkina Faso, the Cayman Islands, Haiti, Jordan, Malo, Morocco, Myanmar, the Philippines, Senegal and South Sudan.
Other nations included on the list include Afghanistan, Barbados, Cambodia, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Iran, Jamaica, Myanmar, Nicaragua, Pakistan, Panama, Syria, Trinidad and Tobago, Uganda, Vanuatu, Yemen and Zimbabwe.
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