Companies looking to utilise live video streaming in order to bolster their online sports betting offering should strive to secure exclusive rights to specific events, according to Ross McEacharn, commercial director of Perform Group.

Hosting an animated debate at the BetMarkets conference earlier this month, McEacharn was quick to dismiss views that webstreaming was not suited to the live, in-play betting sector due to latency problems.

"Live online video streaming is just as quick as television. In fact, Flash streaming methods ensure images are delivered as fast, and in many instances, faster than TV pictures. This makes it the perfect in-play betting product."

Although the technology is now in place for webstreaming to be effective, McEacharn said it was important that operators differentiate their product from their competitors.

"Many sports events are not widely distributed on television and not strong enough to generate a large online pay-per-view audience," he said. "Exclusivity is therefore a major plus point for the online gaming industry, when there is no blanket coverage on terrestrial TV."

McEacharn said that a successful webstreaming operation was all about finding a niche: "Be strategic. Content that is widely available on mass-market television will have less value than those events that aren’t available."

Perform began streaming sports to betting services in 2005 and launched a dedicated web-television service, www.WatchandBet.tv, the following year.