Can New Live Casino Suppliers Disrupt the Market?

(0:00 - 1:27) Surya: AI dealers will be taking over the live casino space. Do you think it is actually going to take over? Nadiya: You're opening Pandora's box. What's the whole point of live dealers? Surya: I have a counter for that. Nadiya: Normally the bigger you grow, the less you start listening to the customer, and that's where the problems start. Surya: Startups look for newer providers who are more flexible.

Nadiya: People are looking for innovation, for something new. Surya: Where do you think the live casino space is going? Nadiya: People just see, of course, this is a person. But what about the player? Surya: Everything is being controlled through cameras and the technology. How true is it? Nadiya: For us, we have behind-the-scenes behaviour also. Surya: What are the plans for ImagineLive? Nadiya: It's a complete game changer right now.

Surya: Barcelona, Dubai, São Paulo, Madrid, and now we're here in Manila. We spoke to leaders, experts, as well as industry pioneers, talking about what's happening in Asia, what's also happening with the Filipino gaming market and the wider Asian region. This series is brought to you by Kensho Media. They have been helping iGaming companies rank higher with SEO since 2008. This series is also brought to you by Quantum Gaming.

They help companies with white label and turnkey solutions in emerging markets. This year we're doing the Real Roadshow initiative as part of iGaming Real Talk, where we go to iGaming events all around the world and cover the insights from the ground. Stay tuned and subscribe to iGaming. (1:36 - 3:45) Surya: Hello and welcome back to another episode. I'm here with Nadiya from ImagineLive, and we are here at SiGMA Asia in Manila. Very excited to have you, Nadiya.

Nadiya: Very excited to be here. Thank you. Surya: You've had great experience in iGaming itself. You've worked at many different companies and countries as well. So where do you live now? Nadiya: I live in Malta. I've only been in Malta for 20 years. Surya: Almost Maltese now then. Nadiya: I am Maltese, actually. Surya: Okay, okay. Nadiya: But I live on the airplane, I would say. I travel a lot for business and I love it. Surya: I think we all do at this point.

We have so many events, but it's still worth it, right? Nadiya: And I love Asia. I love Manila. Surya: First of all, let's talk about your role at ImagineLive, which is very recent. You joined as Chief Commercial Officer, right? What does your role involve, and why did you take this role at ImagineLive? What do you think about the company itself? Nadiya: I love it. Why did I take the role?

Because I can see the potential in the product and that I can bring it to the next level. As a Chief Commercial Officer, I'm a very strategic person, and I love bringing a product which is great here to the next level. I see a big opportunity. Surya: Yeah. Okay, cool. Where do you see the live space going? Because it has been a category dominated by two to three big players for a long time, but things are changing, as we see in the market.

What is the current situation with live, and where is it going? Nadiya: You're 100% right. Coming from the RNG space before, I was at NetEnt, Relax Gaming, Games Global, Microgaming back in the days. The slot space is so crowded. There are thousands of suppliers nowadays, while if you look at the live space, it's still, like you mentioned, three main players, and there are new kids coming.

So I think at the moment it's a nice gap, a window of opportunity for new players who have a good, high-quality premium product to jump in because people are looking for innovation. People are looking for something new. People are looking for different and modern technology. Technology is super important. You have to be flexible. You need to use AI. You need to use other things and innovation, basically, to be competitive and to be fast.

This is something which new suppliers can bring because the technology is much more modern. (3:46 - 5:20) Surya: Okay, cool. How long has the ImagineLive brand been active, and what do you think makes the brand and the product different from others in the market? Nadiya: I would start from the end. I think it's quality and speed of delivery. People are impatient. They want things fast. Surya: Yeah, the attention span is... Nadiya: Completely.

And they want a high-quality product at the same time, but at a decent price. So I think commercials are important, high quality is important, and speed of delivery. Those are three main factors in this industry. And, of course, regulation and your licences. How fast can you provide the certificates or be in the market to do an integration? That all counts.

You need to understand the market, and you also need to take operators' feedback into consideration because if you don't listen, normally the bigger you grow, the less you start listening to the customer because you think you know it all, and that's where the problems start. Surya: That is true because it's either my way or no way. Nadiya: My way. Surya: Right.

And that's where startups, the newer operators, start to look for newer providers who are more flexible to their needs. Nadiya: Exactly. So another downside can be, “I know it all,” or, “We know it better than you,” and you stop listening. Surya: Okay. So it's a combination of being able to give better commercials with the same level of quality and speed of delivery without any latency. That is what I'm hearing. Nadiya: Speed of delivery without latency, yes.

But speed of delivery also at the back. Customer integrations, everything. They don't need to wait for weeks. Surya: Yes, exactly. If they want to go live yesterday, you basically need to make sure that they go live yesterday. (5:25 - 6:17) Surya: Where do you think the live casino space is going? Are there any specific markets you see that are really growing very rapidly? Nadiya: Yeah, I can see quite a few emerging markets growing, and also on different continents.

We see a lot of traction in LATAM. Surya: Not only in Brazil but in the neighbouring countries. Nadiya: Yeah, because we see LATAM as Brazil mainly. I actually learned recently here that there are different Spanish languages. I thought Spanish is Spanish. No, there's Colombian Spanish, there's so many different Spanish variations. For example, we as a company recruit local dealers to deliver the product based on local needs. So it's part of localization.

Another emerging market which is still picking up is Africa. A lot of people are talking about Africa and Asia now. We're in the Philippines here. It got regulated, so it's also very different. I used to go to Asia a lot five years ago throughout my career, and it's a complete game changer right now. So I would say those three are interesting ones to watch. Surya: Okay. Very nice.

(6:19 - 7:38) Surya: Recently, when we look at the trends as well, we're seeing some interesting new products coming up in the market. For example, AI dealers. There is chatter that I see on LinkedIn and also other forums in the market where they say AI dealers will be taking over the live casino space because basically there is no management needed, no admin needed, nothing needed, and everything is tech. What do you think about it?

Do you think it is actually going to take over? Nadiya: You're opening Pandora's box here. From one side, yes, it looks brilliant. I saw some. We also have this technology. We can deliver an AI dealer, and some do. But there's a big but. Surya: Exactly. Nadiya: What's the whole point of live dealer? It's live. You want to bring a live casino or live person. If you put AI behind the scene, yes, it looks amazing. It's a real person.

It can be tuned and taught how to respond to the players, to answer exactly what you want. But it's RNG. So where is live here? It's a very, very debatable thing. If you look into it from one side, you want to play with a real person. You want to know that there is another real person on the other side and not just something imaginable. Time will show, I would say. But I have this perception because people just see the person. But what about the player?

The players want a person. The players don't want another RNG game behind the scenes. Surya: I have a counter for that. Nadiya: Okay. (7:40 - 9:51) Surya: A lot of people say that even in land-based casinos or even online, I don't know for a fact, but I've heard that there are cameras everywhere and it's not even really on the person because everything is being controlled through cameras and the technology that is trained and so on. How far is it true?

Nadiya: Trained in what sense? Surya: In the sense that even a live dealer is being watched on cameras, and then signals are being sent in terms of controlling the outcomes. Nadiya: Not outcomes. I wouldn't say so because, again, it depends which market. But, for example, in our studios I can speak on behalf of us. Cameras, yes, but it's for security, for fraud prevention and so on. So yes, you need those things.

The other factor of control where, for example, we're using technology, we're using AI in dealer behaviour. Yesterday, for example, we met a big customer here and they told us, “We went live in this market, but the dealers were so bored. We don't want to work with the supplier. They literally look like they want to sleep.” For example, for us, we have AI behind the scenes monitoring dealers' behaviour.

This is a project which we started two years ago, and it took two years to get us to this level, to train it and make sure that if the dealer is not chatty enough or something like that, it sends an instant message to be more engaged with the player. Surya: Yeah. So that's something which helps players to be more happy. Nadiya: But making sure that things are not real, I haven't heard about it. Surya: Okay, interesting. Maybe it happens in land-based casinos.

Maybe that's what I heard. Nadiya: Again, my experience with the Asian market from the past, specifically from the live side, was that every table had a special thing. It's like a clock where basically you have a number and you can call, and the last four digits of your number will be displayed on this table to see that it's real. Surya: Okay.

Nadiya: I haven't seen it a lot lately, but in the past it was very, very common because players didn't trust that it's live, especially in this side of the world. They wanted to call. They wanted to see that it's instant. And before the call, it was actually a fresh newspaper every day. They used to display it in the background, a fresh newspaper, just to show it's real. So trust issues are important, but I guess the market moved on from this with technology and everything.

People got more trust, and also players changed. Surya: Yeah. (9:54 - 10:53) Surya: You mentioned a very important point when we talked about the AI dealer versus the human dealer, which is basically that the player wants to have an experience of playing with a person. Nadiya: Yeah. It's live, you know. Surya: That's very good to know. I hadn't thought about it. Nadiya: It's something I started thinking about when I saw them. They look beautiful. It's so fun.

They talk to you. But it's hard. It's hard to recognize if they are real or not. I think about another perspective. When everything is too perfect, life becomes boring. It's like when you love chocolate and you eat chocolate every day. You don't want it after a week. So, see, everything is perfect. Even a person who makes mistakes sometimes, who's genuine, who's natural, I think that type of thing matters.

Again, it's my own opinion, but I'm one of the people who likes placing the bets and so on to understand the product because you need to gamble to understand what you're doing. Surya: Mhm. Nadiya: And again, players are like that. You need to think about what players want, not what the company wants to save costs. Surya: Absolutely. (10:57 - 12:26) Surya: What are the plans for ImagineLive in the next few months, in 2026 and beyond?

Nadiya: To continue the good job that we're doing. We have a lot of regulated markets. We're growing and expanding the commercial team as well, to deliver our customers a good-quality product and to deliver the games. We're very creative about the game shows and new products. This is something the market wants because roulette is roulette, blackjack is blackjack, but there is room for new opportunities, especially with the new generation of players, the younger ones.

This generation is totally different, and we have a couple of cool things coming out. We have a big release in a month's time, and we're going to continue on this more creative path to basically keep the traditional live casino but also bring new innovation and concepts into the existing product to make sure it's still live, but also caters for different player demographics. Surya: Okay. Can you give me a scoop of where we're going in terms of those new product innovations?

Nadiya: If I give you a scoop... Yesterday I just mentioned something very little. The guy got exactly what we're doing. So I can tell you, stay tuned. You would be impressed. It's big. Surya: Okay. Maybe we talk about it in Lisbon. Nadiya: Lisbon for sure. [Unclear]. You're welcome to come and see it. Surya: Perfect. Thank you so much, Nadiya, for joining me and sharing your insights. It's always a pleasure to have real talk. Nadiya: And thank you for hosting us.

It's a pleasure. Surya: Thank you guys for watching. That's it for today and for this episode. Do share your thoughts in the comments below. Like, subscribe, follow Nadiya as well as