The betting technology that powers the most popular online sportsbooks and casinos around the world is the driving force behind an online gambling industry that’s projected to be worth $153 Billion USD by 2030. Without the backend technology to provide games, facilitate deposits, wagers, and payouts between operators and their players, the online gambling industry simply wouldn’t exist.

But who’s responsible for creating this technology? And as someone who runs or wants to start an online casino, should you develop your own betting technology in-house?

Let’s start by answering the first question.

There are several companies around the world like Lion Gaming that provide betting technology for iGaming operators. Depending on the country or region iGaming operators want to run their business in, they may or may not be able to work with certain technology providers. This is due to the fact that betting technology must be compliant with gaming regulations in specific regions. For example, operating in the USA and the UK require different licenses than those that can be used for regions like Latin America, Eastern Europe, or the Indian Subcontinent.

Sportsbook and online casino technology providers spend millions of dollars and countless hours developing, maintaining, and updating their technology to ensure the operators they partner with provide a flawless betting experience for their players. In many cases, these betting technology providers don’t run their own iGaming operations, but solely focus on licensing their technology for operators who want to start their own iGaming business. In fact, some of the most popular sportsbooks outsource their betting technology to companies like Lion Gaming.

Which leads us to the next question.

The answer to this question depends on three factors.

• The amount of time you have to launch a product
• The financial capital you have to allocate toward developing technology
• The human capital required to develop, maintain, and upgrade your betting technology

For iGaming operators who are just starting out and want to bring a product to market relatively quickly, developing your own betting technology in-house isn’t a suitable option. It can take years to develop online casino or sports betting software that is reliable and compliant with gaming regulations.

Most new operators are better served by outsourcing their sportsbook or casino technology with a company like Lion Gaming. Instead of the years it would take to develop technology in-house, you can opt for a white label solution complete with your unique branding and be up and running in weeks instead. Read more about Lion Gaming’s suite of online casino and sportsbook software powered by the Fer0x Engine to see how quickly you can get up and running.

When thinking about bringing betting technology in-house, operators also need to consider the financial and human resource costs associated with doing so. To say that they are not cheap would be an understatement.

A team of casino software developers to build the product you want to offer players along with lawyers who ensure that the technology you’ve invested time and money in building is compliant with regulations can quickly run into the multi-million dollar range. And that’s just to build the technology itself. There are additional costs associated with maintaining it, upgrading it, and keeping it compliant with changing regulations.

White label betting technology eliminates the financial burden of bringing an iGaming operation to market. The licensing fees that iGaming operators pay to outsource their betting technology to providers like Lion Gaming are quite literally a fraction of what they would pay to develop their own technology in-house. Operators can spend that money more wisely on customer acquisition and player retention initiatives to help grow their business.

Established operators who have scaled their business and have the capacity to incur the financial and human resource costs associated with building their own betting technology can seriously consider bringing their technology in-house. However, what they need to understand is that the existing expertise that brought them to the point of running a successful iGaming operation isn’t directly translatable to successful software development.

It’s likely that the operator’s expertise is in areas like customer acquisition, customer retention, sales, and customer support. These are vastly different than software development and legal skills. In a strange kind of irony, these established operators who no longer plan on outsourcing their betting technology instead choose to outsource the skills required to bring that same technology in house. It can save some money in the very long term, but there have been several cases of successful operators who have tried to bring technology in-house that ultimately ended up failing due to the skills and knowledge gap associated with doing so. An alternative option for operators who are looking to move on from their existing betting technology is to consider migrating their betting technology to a new software provider.

If you’re wondering whether you should develop your own betting technology or outsource it, contact us here or email us at [email protected] and we’ll happily offer our expertise to determine the best path forward depending on where you are in your journey as an iGaming operator.