Despite a compressed three-day schedule, the conference contained a lot of interesting, information-rich events, such as the third edition of Malta Gaming Awards with 28 different categories, and ‘hackathon’, a kind of brainstorming game where software developers solve non-trivial tasks for a prize of $50,000. Furthermore, six conferences and the same number of seminars were planned at the summit.
A number of issues relevant to the gambling industry were discussed at the conference, and the speakers were able to shed light on many aspects the audience was interested in. Gaminglicense.com experts attended some of the summit meetings and also watched streams of individual events in real time.
At the first conference, which was on online gambling regulatory issues, the floor was given to Joseph Muscat, the Prime Minister of Malta. He said that Malta is going to continue to be a hub of online gambling and emphasized that the synergy between iGaming, blockchain technologies and artificial intelligence is crucial for the industry development.
Heathcliff Farrugia, CEO at the MGA, also delivered a long speech expressing his position on the revision of Malta’s gambling legislation (Gaming Act 2018) which came into the effect this summer. He mentioned that the new version of the law is fundamentally different from the previous one: a risk-based approach has been developed, the gambling license validity period has been extended to 10 years, the taxation model has been changed and the term “low-risk games” has been implemented. From his speech, it can be concluded that gambling business licensing is being significantly simplified, however, the regulator (MGA) is getting more tools and options to audit licensees in order to detect suspicious transactions and other noncompliances.
On the same day, discussions on such topics as “Evolution of Programmatic Advertising in Gambling Business” and “Prospects of Regulating Gambling in Africa” were held in other halls. At 2:30 p.m. local time, representatives of an American company Salesforce presented their own CRM for gambling projects. The first day of the summit ended with a conference on blockchain technologies, investments and ICO regulations.
The second and third days of the summit also had a very tight and intensive program. On November 29, the attendees watched with great interest a presentation of iGaming Academy experts, which was dedicated to responsible gaming, financial data protection and optimizing financial transactions costs. After that, there was a panel discussion where delegates of Forbes, Quizando, ZBO, Coinpointnet and Bitbay talked about possible risks, problems and solutions related to cryptocurrency. Finally, on the third day, the attendees could visit two conferences covering gaming industry in general and esports in particular.
Throughout all three days, there was running an exhibition of cutting-edge solutions and products of foremost developers, such as GameArt, GiG, Microgaming, etc. Guests could learn about the latest achievements of biggest gaming solution providers with the help of interactive wall monitors and play a poker game, organized by the Lithuanian company BetGames, during a break between conferences.
SiGMA-2018 gathered the most prominent representatives of the iGaming, on whom the future of the industry largely depends. Hundreds of big names, large providers, experts and investors arrived at the summit to exchange views, get acquainted with new developments, discover new ideas and convey their position in a casual atmosphere. Without doubt, thanks to this brilliantly organized government-backed event, Maltese gambling licenses will become even more popular among online casino operators.
