Mega Ace

How to play Mega Ace

Local operators, meanwhile, have tried to close the gap by strengthening their technology, including working with world-class suppliers.

This can be difficult, however, as Atucha explains some larger platforms entering LatAm will only work with tier 1 operators, rather than helping smaller companies develop. “It’s challenging because first, whatever you would consider a tier 3 or a tier 2 or even a startup in an emerging market like Latin America can eventually become a tier 1 operator,” Atucha suggests.

“We’ve got lots of cases, EstrelaBet being one of them. They started from nothing and they grew a lot. And probably platform suppliers will have ignored them and regret that later on. You’ve got lots of cases like that.”

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“I don’t think the successful studio of the future necessarily has hundreds of people,” he says. “It could be a relatively small group of extremely talented people with great ideas, strong brands and a very good understanding of players, supported by technology that does much of the heavy lifting.”

That would also shift the basis on which studios compete. If sophisticated development capabilities become accessible to a wider range of creators, scale alone becomes less of an advantage.

“It becomes less about how many developers you employ and much more about how creative you are and how well you understand the player,” Curwen says.

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“As a trade organisation we are trying to work together with our regulator because we feel that we have a shared interest of getting a good legal market. And of course we’re talking to politicians to do something about putting illegal operators on notice. I think it is really positive at the moment in the Netherlands that the operators have really teamed up,” Petra continues.

Notably, she says competing with each other is not important at the moment, as working to fight the black market serves a bigger purpose.

Finally, after four years in the hot seat, is Petra still enjoying the job? “Absolutely. It’s challenging, it feels like you’re playing in the Champions League sometimes because a lot is asked of the people in the sector. You’ve got responsible gambling, anti-money laundering and, at the same time, you have to offer a fun experience. But it’s nice to be challenged,” she concludes.