It's time for more social, more mobile and more channels.
2011 was the year mobile became mass market across all gambling products. As 2010 saw every operator launch on mobile, 2011 saw the customers flock in as smartphones became mass appeal.
Combine this with the mobile sportsbook product maturing, and we saw companies turning over up to 40 per cent of their sports betting business on mobile alone. Horse racing found a channel that was tailored to its 'bet then watch' model, with racing streaming particularly suited to the mobile device. In-play was another mobile sportsbook driver, being perfectly suited to the instant entertainment that mobile customers crave.
Then the beginnings of mobile poker and casino developed. Products began to emerge from many vendors. The app stores themselves still have varying and inconsistent application processes, but these have been exploited with the right knowledge.
I expect 2012 to see the mobile platform mature even further alongside the evolving mobile technology platform. Particular trends include more streaming, more complex product suites, more gestural interfaces, less webby interfaces and more feature rich casino and poker. 2012 will see specially designed tablet applications for the first time. The tablet gives a unique user experience that operators will look to exploit in the coming year. The 'one web-app fits all' scenario is no longer acceptable, especially for the higher-revenue tablet user.
Another new channel that will begin to show its face in 2012 is Smart TV. Not to be confused with the disastrous interactive TV platform, Smart TV (or Connected TV) will bring apps to your television for the first time. I expect the first gambling TV app products to emerge in 2012. However, there are many challenges this channel brings, including fragmented manufacturer support and the new concept of multi-user gambling through one screen - I imagine the first vendors out of the gates won't see immediate success.
Everyone spent the whole of 2011 talking about social, but with not many finding much direct revenue success. Paddy Power made an interesting move with Betdash and our partner company Passoker went live on Victor Chandler, but none of the Facebook-style betting companies seemed to make as big a splash as everyone hoped.
I expect 2012 to see social becoming more deeply integrated into gaming operators' sites and the emergence of the first direct revenue making social betting products. How Facebook and Zynga reposition themselves with regards to gambling will be very interesting. Rumours circulated at the end of this year that Facebook was looking at licensing operators in the UK. How it does this while still yielding value for the operator (and the competing advertising operators) will be interesting. Post-IPO Zynga too is a new beast and must be looking for new revenue streams. Its break from its reliance on Facebook also makes the jump into real-play gambling more of a possibility.
Regulation has also been an interesting trend in 2011. As the turbulent economic times continue, governments are looking for more revenue and the taxation of gaming is a natural starting point. France refused to budge on its failing sports betting regulation, while Germany created its own disaster waiting to happen. The big story that was happening all the way through 2011 though was whether or not the US would open up, but it didn't.
So that leaves the US as the big story for 2012. One to also watch in 2012 is what the UK government does with its relatively open regulatory environment - this will have repercussions across Europe.
This emerging regulatory patchwork leaves pan-European gaming companies with a potentially expensive infrastructure and operating bill. Whether this will lead to more consolidation, or leave room for many localised operators, or indeed allow for the replacement of the legal monopolies with de-facto business monopolies remains to be seen.
