SBC News SBC Interview - Jessica Ordovas de Ussia on Platform Independence

SBC Interview – Jessica Ordovas de Ussia on Platform Independence

jessica
Jessica Ordovas de Ussia

Team SBC catches up with Mediatech Solutions CEO – Jessica Ordovas de Ussia, to discuss igaming platforms integration, igaming operational trends and creating independent platforms.

Jessica Ordovas de Ussia is founder and CEO of Mediatech Solutions. In 2009 she co-founded Mediatech which has grown to be market leader in online platforms in the gambling industry in Spain with 20% market share and initiated a very successful international expansion with clients in Mexico, USA and Holland. She recently set up Mediatech Asian base in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia.

Ordovas joined the gaming sector in 2003 where she worked in Codere leading the JV with William Hill and launched the first sport betting operations in Spain. Prior to joining Codere, Ordovas worked for 8 years in the UK where she successfully launched and grew businesses in Media, Internet as well as working in Strategy consulting. She holds a BSc (Hons) in Economics from The London School of Economics (London, UK) and Masters in International Economics from SDA Bocconi (Milan,Italy).

SBC: Hi Jessica, pleasure to meet you. Can you summarise how the Media Tech Solutions (MTS) player management system differs to others available in the igaming market?

Jessica: Mediatech Solutions offers a truly content agnostic platform with proven track record that is quite unique in the market. By controlling the platform the operator gains true control over its offering ensuring a differentiation in product and offering as well as the ability to choose other best-in-class components for an efficient operation. Mediatech provides a very flexible solution which gives our clients the best of both worlds: cost effectiveness and control. Our platform has been integrated to the largest content providers and networks in the world. We also understand that launching a new online operation is not easy so we offer additional services if required that result in the ease, cost effectiveness and reduced risk of a turn-key solution.

If an operator signs up to a turn-key provider then they get a standard skin of web/mobile portal and a product suite related to that supplier. If another company comes into the market, and signs up with the same turn-key provider a similar offering and makes it very hard for an operator to differentiate itself making it a battle of marketing budgets. With our solution we could change the product mix, affiliate strategy, and change the web/mobile interface etc. at any time to create a USP in the market no matter what the relative marketing spend.

On a more technical level, there are several aspects that make our platform solution different from others available. The client controls the customer database. For example, the operator chooses which info to share with third parties like game providers and payment gateways. Our system has best in class third party content and best in class third party back end systems: over the last 18 months we have completed many integrations in these two fields. The platform helps clients to leverage existing assets, for example registration in a point of sale, deposits and withdrawals etc. Customisation of the platform is easy, for example because of regulatory requirements. The product has been fully tested by the main international laboratories. An internal control system can be fully integrated (digital vault), which guarantees security, data consistency and player protection and allow auditing by any third party. It provides sustained access to data over time.

I would also like to stress that, apart from technical advantages of our platform, we highly value our client relationships and their commercial success above anything else.

SBC: MTS places a high strategic emphasis on being independent from established igaming software services, your system has no set attachment to a particular provider. Why is this feature important to your business and clients?

Jessica: We believe that for an operator having the best content for their customers is one of the keys for success. However, it is very hard for any provider to be best in class in all categories of games all the time. The independence of the  platform and the content allows the operator to choose the best games for their market at any time without being tied up by their platform choice.

We have no attachment to a particular provider since it’s the only way to be truly independent, nor do we compete against the component/content providers. We work together with them to optimise the relationship, both technically and personally. We become an integral part of the client team to ensure detailed project management at all stages, and add value by considering the project in the wider context.

Mediatech is highly focused on the technological approach, providing best-in-class components and content. Mediatech ensures that the technology works in the context of market, regulation and multiple providers.

We believe our strict approach of neutrality gives as the opportunity to ‘sell’ our product on an international scale.

SBC: Having the ability to work with numerous igaming software developers, using different platforms and systems must be hard to undertake. How does your team scale the data and information provided by all the separate software providers. 

Jessica: Indeed as you mention a multiple game integration is hard to manage since unlike the land based world there is no standard in the protocols of communication. It is hard not only because games have very different messages but also due to the fact that on top of the technical work you need to ensure consistency in other operational areas like business intelligence, CRM etc.

It is also important to note that as a platform provider it is not only game integrations that are required but other back end solutions as well e.g. payment methods, affiliates and regulatory requirements.

Therefore after completing over 20 integrations we have learnt about the importance of planning carefully the technical building process, paying a high level of importance on the data warehousing and exceptional cases (e.g. disconnections, cancel bets, time zones disparities) and lastly ensuring a detailed operational run through of every new integration.

For scalability the critical points we have worked on are:

Internal processes and procedures that ensure the integration is fully planned and the project is managed in detail i.e. not only the technical construction process but as mentioned earlier operational review, certifications etc.

Dedicated team members that are focused on integrations and can therefore feed all the lessons learnt into the process and ensure tight project management. This is a constant improvement of our Game Integration component so that we can feed in lessons learnt of each integration and game type and hence constantly expanding the flexibility, quality and depth of each integration and future ones.

Where possible we push to standardisation. We are considering joining GSA and believe standardization will be the logical result in the future.

SBC: You work with many first time ventures in igaming, many of whom will come from non-traditional gaming markets, how do you and your team guide them through the complexities of igaming?

Jessica: We have helped very different companies in different jurisdictions plan their and execute their online launches.

One of the biggest learning’s is that companies entering should spend enough time and money defining their positioning and product mix before they start working on the solution. They should only go online once they are convinced they have a positioning that is going to win the hearts of online players and build them a profitable business. Too often operators start by looking at providers of solutions making some key decisions too soon. Additionally the slow regulatory ramp up with then a very fast application and launch process means there is little time after launch to refine that initial positioning.

So our first focus with our customers is to ensure they truly understand an online operation and focus all their energy on the design of the future business.

Our multi-disciplinary team has valuable consulting experience in strategy, technology and operations. Our focus is on providing insight for clients looking to enter the online space, or a new geographical territory or both. Our consultants provide guaranteed independent evaluation of options and are matter experts on market-by-market regulation and compliance.

Once the client is ready to go online, we try to give them maximum support, ranging from helping them design their organization ensuring they leverage existing strengths, helping them set up their call centres and fraud department and to simply acting as a sounding board in certain areas.

SBC: Do you worry that igaming operators are becoming generic in their offerings to players, in many territories we see the same igaming verticals being offered to players. What are your thoughts on this matter?

Jessica: It is true that due to some consolidation there seems to be a lot of similar offerings in the market and similar marketing strategies. However we believe that never before has there been as many exciting new games, hybrids and ways to create a differentiated position. In fact if you don’t have a differentiated position you mainly compete with the size of your marketing budgets so we see a real opportunity for smaller players that do things differently. One of the main obstacles sometimes for this differentiation is regulatory processes and in this aspect we will work with our operators to help them in these aspects since we have a very strong compliance team.

We believe that the success we are experiencing is mainly driven by this will to create different offerings.

SBC: In the coming months what factors relating to igaming do you feel will have the biggest impact on your business, how will you look to handle these challenges

Jessica; There are 3 aspects that are the talk of the industry but that we see as extremely relevant to our business:

  1. Continued regulation of new countries – reducing the scope of global operations and the emergence of a country by country licensing and focus.
  2. Technological convergence between land based and online – many countries regulation now will leap frog some of the technological steps taken in Europe and at some stage in the future the platforms will converge.
  3. The increase of depth in the current game offering. We will see more and more specific providers appear as technology allows to create very specific products and distribute them at a lower cost.

We are working on the geographical focus by expanding into Latin America and Asia. Within Asia it is highly relevant when countries put regulation on online gambling in place. It is clear that markets will open up, but the speed will differ tremendously between countries and a whole set of country specific factors play in role in shaping these regulations. It is highly relevant for us because our ‘Player Account System’ is only offered in regulated market which requires a high standard of compliance and regulatory understanding.

To ensure our presence in markets ahead of regulation we have a pre online regulation offering. We offer dedicated consultancy services: we bring in our theoretical and practical experiences in online and land based gaming. Besides that we have a social gaming/marketing platform. This is a product and supplier agnostic platform for regulated and non-regulated markets. It provides a platform for brand reach and engagement outside real-money gaming activity, based on real time data on users and products.

For the other points we have teams actively dedicated to each one ensuring that in terms of integration and platform design we are ready for the future.

Last but not least, I like to stress that we are unique: we focus only on platform software and are truly independent. We are pretty much alone in that niche. That enabled us to get 20% market share in Spain and now we are growing rapidly outside Spain. We are especially attractive to media groups and land based casino groups.

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Jessica Ordovas de Ussia – CEO – MediaTech Solutions

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