BetGames
BetGames interview: Twain Sport’s debut in Canada
With BetGames’ Twain Sport now live in Ontario, we thought it would be the perfect time to sit down the company’s VP for Europe, Asia & Americas, John-Paul Rowland, to hear more about their plans for Canada.
Offering a completely new hybrid version of sports betting via soccer and basketball, with short-form, live action tournaments and a new match every few minutes, John-Paul takes us through his company’s unique proposition for serving the new ‘Tik-Tok generation’ of players.
With Twain Sport now debuting in Ontario, BetGames will no doubt be very excited to get started! What are your plans for the market and how are you going to make a difference?
We’re very excited to get started! It’s a real landmark launch for us following on from Twain’s debut in Europe and Africa with some of the industry’s biggest tier one brands.
Twain Sport is a completely new hybrid version of live sport – offering matches every four minutes and tournaments every hour, and we’ve been delighted with the impact we’ve had so far. At the end of the day, the market needs innovative content right now, and Twain is here to deliver exactly that.
We’re here to cater to a sports-mad audience in Canada, and we’re filling the gap in demand for short-form live-action sporting content. We know exactly where the opportunity lies for us here, and we believe players in North America are going to love what we have to offer. Our extensive research ahead of launching on the continent identified exactly which demographics and audiences we’ll be entertaining, and we see an excellent product fit there.
When it comes to player demographics – what made you identify the market as a key opportunity and what kind of players do you think Twain Sport will appeal to the most?
As we’ve covered already – Ontario, and indeed Canada, is a fantastic opportunity for us. For a start, the average bettor is between 25 and 30 years old, which is the exact demographic we’re targeting with Twain Sport, as we offer high-turnover, fast action live sport for what is effectively the ‘Tik Tok’ generation, meaning we fit the bill perfectly.
I believe this demand for new shorter-form content is exactly what the market is looking for right now, and we’re here to fulfil that requirement. As I’ve mentioned above, the new generation of player is looking for instant thrills and payouts, similar to what you have with the likes of casino, rather than waiting hours for an NFL match to finish. Twain Sport brings that format into play, bridging both live sport and high-frequency betting.
Given that Twain Sport offers a unique proposition of short-form, live-action betting, do you see your products complementing sportsbook spend?
Yes, I do – BetGames has made a name for itself over the last decade as one of the best out there for complementing and boosting sportsbook spend, so we know exactly what we’re doing with Twain!
With us, players have a match every four minutes, and tournaments every hour. This makes it the perfect product if you’re looking at the weekend’s sporting calendar, you have hour increments between major sporting fixtures, which means we’ve got entertainment ready on tap during downtime.
In my view, this works perfectly for two types of demographics, the first being bettors who time their participation around the schedule, which they know in advance (just like with a race card), and for those browsing the lobby, who, just like with virtuals, see our four-minute increments between games, and are happy to wait 60-90 seconds until the next match.
For our North American readers, how soon do you see Twain Sport making the step into the US, where basketball is also hugely popular?
For me, the key lies in our partnerships and how we service them. Our move into the US will be influenced by both player demand, which will be driven by initial interest on social media, where a lot of our content is being shared already. The second, will of course operator traffic, and that will likely govern our first moves south of the Canadian border.
Looking at the dynamics of what we offer, if you, as a US-based operator, want to keep bettors engaged and on site, then Twain’s perfect for that given the strengths we’ve already covered. Not only that, but the US also offers a unique land-based sports betting environment that we’ll be perfect for too. If you enter any sports betting zone in a casino, you’ll see we’ve got the perfect entertainment for the social aspect of betting there – in effect, short-form, live action basketball for fans to enjoy while they have beer and wings at the sports bar. It really is the ideal product.
Given that Twain Sport’s studios are based in Europe – how do you see streaming and live-action gameplay completing the adjusted time zone on the other side of the Atlantic? Is this a case of launching a bespoke set of schedules?
If there’s a need to and/or a demand for custom scheduling, then of course we can look into that – we’re all about complementing our partners’ existing sports schedules to the best of our ability.
However, our vision for Twain is not to compete with big sports events (i.e. the evening matches), but rather complementing the downtime in between matches, and indeed before, which is during the day. That fits perfectly with the way we currently stream from Europe, with matches available from lunchtime and onwards for a North America audience. After all, distracting players during the big games in the evening would be cannibalising from sportsbook spend!
Last but not least, what would your message be for new operators looking to get in on the Twain Sport action, what can they expect by signing up?
They’ll get something completely different in their portfolio – and the perfect product to bridge the gap between live sports and casino-style staking! As we’ve covered already – we’re all about complementing spend, as well as boosting engagement and incremental revenue.
Given what we offer, we’ve got the exact solution to make both casino and sports fans feel right at home. Not only that, but it’s a product that can be inherently trusted. Our participants are professional athletes at the top of their game, as well as being monitored by Sportradar for integrity – which is the same level tech you’ll see with the likes of FIBA and UEFA. As well as delivering top quality entertainment, we also offer quantity. Even slots do not offer a tournament ever hour – so I have no doubt we can not only appeal to every major demographic, but also offer something truly innovative that is unlike anything else on the market.
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With modern technology constantly developing and the Canadian market at the forefront of an ever-evolving landscape, BetGames Chief Product Officer, Ian Catchick, is sure its groundbreaking latest launch earlier this year, Twain Sport, is set to spearhead the next generation of sports betting. Here, he details just how the trailblazing product works and how it aims to combine the worlds of sports betting and casino in a new era for bettors.
BetGames is really making waves globally in the iGaming sphere – could you tell us more about your universal appeal for those Canadian readers who might be unfamiliar?
BetGames has been established for some time, with over a decade of experience to be proud of. Now in its 11th year in the industry, we’ve made a name for ourselves by creating live casino entertainment and live dealer content that makes sports fans feel right at home.
Our latest product to go live in Ontario is Twain Sport – already live with 40+ global operators. The aim is to deliver non-stop, fixed-odds sports betting in a casino format for the new generation of bettors.
Our goal is to deliver content for operators centred around sports betting, while providing the same margins that come with iGaming and casino.
To do this, we’ve created our own proprietary set of sports products that deliver high-octane tournaments of basketball and football, every 60 seconds, in the short-form betting format we know the new generation is looking for.
The numbers on offer are fantastic – with over 1400 matches each day, broadcasted 24/7, our fast-paced, action-packed events are the perfect proposition for operators looking to boost revenue.
What sets Twain Sport apart from other offerings in the market? What gives it that universal appeal at a time when truly unique products are thin on the ground?
It all started with a basic idea to introduce high-quality, unique and competitive live sports content – aimed towards customers who wanted short, fast action. We addressed that with a product that delivered intensive short-form, pre-recorded live rounds of both sports.
Ensuring high turnover and low stakes for extended sessions of engagement, Twain Sport offers something that few, if any, product vertical can – one that appeals to sports and casino fans alike, as well as being designed to truly appeal to a next-gen audience better than any other studio. We have high expectations for Twain Sport in Ontario and expect it to perform incredibly well throughout the upcoming winter months.
Did you have a target audience in mind when envisioning Twain Sport’s success? What’s the thought process behind launching in Canada?
It was certainly a strategic move. For a start, the average Canadian bettor is between 25 and 35 years old, the exact demographic we’re aiming to entertain.
We all know next-gen players are looking for instant thrills and excitement, just like you have with casino games. This is particularly the case if sports matches are playing out on television and players are looking for additional entertainment via mobile.
We take that passion for sport and bring that format into play, bridging both 24/7 sport and high-frequency betting, without any of the barriers to entry you’ll see with many casino games.
We see this as the future of entertainment. Bringing sports into the casino world means attracting sports fans and moving them away from the lower margins associated with in-play sports betting.
By doing that, we’re able to offer a customer lifetime value on a par with casino margins – while greatly boosting your customer base.
How does Twain Sport blend different elements like slots and live casino into its fixed-odds format, making it appealing to the modern sports fan?
There’s no other betting product that comes close to what Twain Sport offers – in many ways, we’ve created an entirely new vertical for bettors to enjoy.
In short, we repackage the basic USPs of slots, virtuals and live casino into one and deliver it in a fixed-odds format where sports fans can feel right at home.
To bring sports punters closer to the casino world, our approach revolves around a few key principles. Our mission is to provide rich, familiar and unique content that delivers high-quality live entertainment experiences.This draws on our core competencies of broadcast, game design and our skills in intuitively knowing and understanding how to create content that our players enjoy.
Speaking of player enjoyment, what makes Twain Sport stand out in comparison to other betting products, particularly in terms of combining slots and live casino elements?
For next-gen players, it’s all about providing an experience that is as simple and accessible as possible.
They’re telling us quite clearly that what they really want is high-quality, engaging, rapid-play, simple-to-understand content.
We know that Twain Sport provides that and more – in launching our game-changing vertical, we’ve done it exactly in a way that deals with the time pressure that the next-gen players have on their demand for entertainment.
We know that they’re very keen to enjoy a combination of what they know right now – in our case – easily understandable sports formats – and newer concepts that enhance their playing experience.
How is Twain Sport’s launch in Canada positioned to meet the current market demand for top-quality betting experiences?
I have no doubt that our launch in Canada with multiple tier-one operators will be a fantastic chance to showcase why this new, shorter-form style of betting content is exactly what the market is demanding right now.
The crucial thing to remember is that our players’ time is very precious, and they want to ensure that the action on offer is high-quality, rapid and revolves around the rest of the entertainment mix.
Twain Sport’s action-packed nature with immediate rewards and a fantastically high production quality allows us to deliver on that goal.
We see Twain Sport as the future, catering to the new generation of players who are looking for instant thrills and payouts. We’re very excited by the prospect of introducing it to another new audience and I’m sure it will be a great show.
Truly unique products are thin on the ground these days but BetGames’ CEO Andreas Koeberl is confident he has a winner on his hands ahead of its launch not the Canadian market. Here, he explains more about the trailblazing product and how it aims to bring the worlds of sports betting and casino closer together.
Twain Sport has caught the attention of many in the industry having gone live with leading brands globally – tell us more about its universal appeal.
It’s a product like no other, essentially. There’s always talk of ‘innovation’ in the industry but I’m not sure the description is always warranted with a lot of similar products. Twain Sport bucks that trend and delivers a brand-new concept that might create its own vertical.
We’ve been able to offer a simple yet engaging proposition globally since evolving Twain Sport to a 24/7 offering, we’re thrilled at how it has performed since launch. But it isn’t the same product we saw on day one either. Beyond the round-the-clock scheduling we now have, we’ve engaged with operators and bettors to build their feedback into subtle tweaks to gameplay and presentation that have given us the more intuitive, mobile-first optimised product we see today.
We haven’t finished with the evolution either. Such an approach proves valuable in consistently strengthening and improving Twain Sport. Coming soon we’re looking at introducing AI-generated commentary in localised languages, allowing us to cater to audiences wherever we operate and scale more effectively. It’s a delight to see it gradually grow and refine.
What was the inspiration behind its development? Did you identify a gap in the market that led to Twain Sport’s creation?
Standard sports betting is so well-established and popular that trying to compete with it wouldn’t have worked. We looked at what was currently popular in the world of social media, gaming and general entertainment, and the trend is toward fast-paced and on-demand.
We wanted to create a product that complimented live sports betting and was easily accessible, presenting the opportunity to enjoy it whenever the mood takes a bettor. Twain Sport’s action-packed nature with immediate rewards and a fantastically high production quality allows us to deliver on that initial goal.
Now we have a fast, fun betting experience that replicates much of what live sport betting offers but is more accessible so that if bettors have 15 minutes to spare between the second and third quarter of a basketball game or can’t wait for the kick-off on the next big soccer match.
So, naturally, they can play a couple of rounds of T-Kick or T-Basket with us. Sixty-second matches every two minutes, 24 hours a day every day allows us to fulfil that promise, keeping bettors engaged, before and after big events – Twain Sport fills the gap and then some.
Speaking of gaps – can Twain Sport achieve the holy grail of cross-selling between major sports and casino-style betting?
Undoubtedly. It offers everything that most casino games do – instant thrills and payouts. BetGames’ roots are in converting sports bettors into casino players. The advantage we have is that Twain Sport bridges that divide without any of the barriers to entry you’ll see with most casino games.
We did our due diligence during early development, looking at the target demographics we’d be putting Twain Sport in front of in each region. The key, is to keep bettors engaged, promoting a reason to cross-sell, and with our stream of on-demand basketball and soccer, we have a unique product that definitely fits the bill. We got it right, and to see that groundwork come to fruition is hugely satisfying.
One of the many reasons that Twain Sport ticks the number of boxes that it does is that it’s a versatile product – bringing sports into the casino world, and attracting sports fans too, moving them away from the lower margins associated with sports betting. It offers operators a lifetime value on par with casino margins, while greatly boosting their customer base.
When will Canadian players see the launch of Twain Sport and how will the market there react?
Now that T-Basket is available 24/7, we’ll be launching very soon indeed and with several operators.
What we’ll be launching with is unlike anything else on the market – Twain Sport offers up 60 seconds of action-packed basketball and football games played by real athletes competing in bespoke one-on-one challenges, every two minutes, throughout the day – so we’re confident it is going to receive the same overwhelmingly positive response it has enjoyed in other regions.
We’re launching into a unique market too – one with incredible potential. We’ve researched our audience and designed Twain Sport to specifically target that 25 – 35-year-old bracket that the average Canadian bettor falls into.
By delivering that demographic the fast-action entertainment it demands, along with our branding options, we can ensure we’re supplying a fantastic tool which helps promote trust and showcases the value and integrity of our brand and product.
SBC’s Canadian Gaming Summit is going to provide the perfect launchpad and the timing couldn’t be better – what do you expect to gain from the event?
Putting Twain Sport and T-Basket in particular front and centre to the very people we need to show it off to is ideal just before we launch in Canada. The market there is buoyant and growing rapidly and with its love of sports and fast-paced entertainment, we couldn’t hope to have an offering more attuned to hit the ground running.
We see Twain Sport as the future, catering to the new generation of players that are looking for instant thrills and payouts. We’re very excited by the prospect of introducing it to another new audience and I’m sure it will be a great show.
Twain Sport, the game-changing sport vertical from BetGames, has made its debut in Brazil and Ontario with Betano, Kaizen Gaming’s leading sports betting operator.
The Betano rollout marks not only the Brazilian debut but also a LatAm first and a strengthening of the existing Canadian presence for Twain Sport’s unique, high-turnover, high-frequency format of 24/7 hybrid sports.
Kaizen Gaming is one of the fastest-growing GameTech companies internationally, having launched the Betano brand in 11 markets so far. Following this activation, the major brand is set to provide a home for Twain Sport across a number of its other key territories in the coming months, representing a major opportunity for growth in several thriving markets.
BetGames’ 24/7 Twain Sport, available in both football (T-Kick) and basketball formats (T-Basket), sees professional athletes compete in daily one-on-one challenges, with non-stop 60-second matches available every two minutes throughout the day.
Together, T-Basket and T-Kick offer 1,440 matches per day and 43,200 per month, in a low-staking, regulation-friendly format.
Unique to the betting industry, Twain Sport has been designed to be the perfect sporting complement for traditional iGaming, offering a high-turnover schedule that boosts both engagement and incremental revenue for operators.
In total, BetGames’ Twain Sport is now live with 60+ operators globally across Europe, Africa and the Americas, with a further 20 contracts currently under negotiation.
Commenting on Twain Sport’s launch with Kaizen, BetGames CEO Andreas Koeberl said: “We’re hugely ambitious with Twain Sport – it’s a product like no other and offers an incredible opportunity for operators. This is reflected in the interest we’ve attracted since launch and leading, major names like Kaizen Gaming are rightly choosing it to boost their brands.
“Kaizen’s presence across several key markets globally offers us a fantastic platform to push on and continue to nurture Twain Sport’s incredible popularity and potential.”
Christos Mavridis, Head of Live Casino at Kaizen Gaming added: “Our partnership with BetGames’ Twain Sport highlights our commitment to offering a special online gaming experience to our customers. The games offered are high-frequency, fast, and exciting in a thoroughly modern package. We are delighted to be able to offer it in Brazil and we are sure that our customers will enjoy it.”
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