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Licensed operators are increasingly asked if their suppliers also service the black market, evidenced most recently at a gathering of Nordic gambling executives.
Amid a rise in supplier licensing and general scrutiny of the sector, senior figures at gambling operators are facing public questions that were largely absent from industry conferences just a few years ago.
At the Scandinavian & Nordic Gaming Show in Copenhagen on Tuesday (November 5), operator representatives were asked if they took pains to make sure that the companies that supply their games and other services were not also serving the black market.
“We have substantial commercial muscle and we ask nicely,” said Jeffrey Haas, the chief growth officer at evoke (formerly 888).
“The conversation comes up during the terms of commercial renewal. We want a level playing field and we want regulators to do their jobs — to shut down anyone offering outside of those fences.”
Supplier licensing is becoming more common worldwide and the regulations that govern those licences are increasingly crafted to ban serving both the legal and illegal markets.
Sweden launched supplier licensing in 2023 with the express intent of preventing offshore operators targeting the country from accessing the same content as licensed operators.
Denmark will require suppliers to be licensed from January 2025, where they will also need to comply with similar conditions.
The US state of Michigan asked earlier this year for suppliers in its market to reveal what other jurisdictions they do business in and Romania added similar requirements to its existing supplier licensing regime in July.
Speaking at the event in Copenhagen, Morton Ronde, the chief executive of the Danish Online Gambling Association, said that suppliers he had spoken to were not looking forward to the new compliance burden that will come with licensing.
But he urged them to see the positives, arguing that answering directly to the regulator, “gives suppliers a real voice in how the industry moves forward. A stronger voice in shaping industry rules and standards.”
“Suppliers are not just following rules anymore, they are helping to create them,” said Ronde.
Sharing the panel alongside Haas, the chief executive of Danish lottery Landbrugslotteriet said that dealing with suppliers that are active both in the regulated and unregulated space was a commercial fact of life.
“That’s the reality, if you want the best games you have to go to those suppliers,” said Bo Flindt Jørgensen.
“The best suppliers they supply to all markets. They don’t care necessarily if it’s black or regulated,” he said.
“Unless the regulators do something to enforce it or make it more strict, I think that’s what we’ll see moving forward.”
