Merkur at SBC Summit: "True omnichannel approaches are one of the most promising ways of still ensuring your margins"

Last week, the latest edition of the SBC Summit drew almost 25,000 attendees to the corridors of the Feira Internacional de Lisboa for three busy days of networking. Among those exhibiting its latest products at the show was gaming giant Merkur Group, which showcased its varied portfolio of solutions to an eager audience, from payment novelties to iGaming titles and terminals, and everything in between.

Within the framework of the event, Yogonet held an exclusive interview with Thomas Bone, CEO of Merkur Online Divisions (B2B), on the first day of the show. In the conversation, Bone discusses the latest novelties in Merkur's portfolio, the potential of omnichannel gaming, and why iGaming is turning social.

What led Merkur to participate in the latest SBC Summit?

We are big fans of the SBC concept. Last year in Barcelona was one of the best events of the entire season. That's why we did not hesitate a single second that we would order a nice booth for the entire Merkur Group because SBC enables us to meet with different target groups, so we can allocate all our online related individual companies because we are quite a large business.

The idea was to offer in one concept everything we do, from gaming content from Edict and Blueprint; and platform technology, which in our case is through Bede; up to payment, which is Paylado, our own e-wallet solution particularly designed for gaming purposes; plus our omnichannel machines and solutions, all under one umbrella.

In that way, we can approach the target groups of sports betting companies, online casino companies, and payment solutions. That's quite unique about SBC, and that's why we really like it.

With so many brands under the umbrella of the Merkur group, this question might be complex to answer in short terms - but what are some of the highlights Merkur brought this time around?

We have, in total, more than 250 companies within our group, but there were some clear highlights at SBC. Content-wise, new latest gaming content was provided by Blueprint and by Edict. All the latest top-notch content was shown at SBC. 

Bede is also performing extremely well on tier-one platforms and we had at SBC the right target group for mid to large operators because, at the end of the day, it's many times economies of scale.

Our omnichannel machines, the Merkur eSOLUTIONS terminals, where you can easily register yourself for different iGaming offerings, sports betting, online casinos, and so on in one shot, are another highlight. You don't have to do the bothersome registration verification each and every time. You can do it once on our devices and then we send all KYC and AML-related information to the individual platforms; it's for the player a truly unique experience.

Another highlight is that we can easily convert cash into e-money within four milliseconds on the devices, which gives players an unbelievable user experience.

With SBC being one of the largest gaming exhibitions in the European market, what are some jurisdictions of the markets that you targeted at the show? 

Market-wise, Germany is of course our home turf; highly important. We will also see improvements on the regulatory side. I'm convinced about it. As of January 1st, we will see improved market conditions in Germany. The UK is also still a super interesting market.

In the Netherlands, from my point of view, the latest legal developments have killed the market. That's such a shame because when it started, it was one of the most interesting markets we had in Europe. But within the last 12 to 24 months, they killed one of the best-regulated markets. 

We see movements in Italy, and that's a market we expect guests from at exhibitions. I think Greece will also be interesting. From my point of view, those are some of the most important markets at SBC for us.

With Merkur's rich history in providing land-based solutions, what can you tell us about the synergies between the retail and iGaming arms of the group?

That's the reason why we invented our omnichannel machines. Nowadays, if you see the requirements in highly regulated markets, it becomes so difficult to become efficient and to still achieve and maintain good margins. True omnichannel approaches are one of the most promising ways of still ensuring your margins, so that's why we invented, within Merkur eSOLUTIONS, these terminals that bridge the gap between the traditional retail world and the online world. 

Many researches have proven by numbers and evidence that those companies who offer the best omnichannel experience get a competitive advantage. That's why this is so important and why we invest millions in developing these technologies. There's nothing more convenient for a player than going to one of our retail venues and that the same quality standard you see there, you also actually realize online, and vice versa.

It would be great if that would be my invention, but unfortunately, that's not the case. If you look at the Nike and Adidas of the world, that's the brand promise they have been giving to their traditional e-commerce customers for years now. And that's why it's so proven that this is by far the most promising approach, because nowadays the player doesn't differentiate between the brand experience online or the brand experience retail. It has to be seamless.

With SBC being a major platform to discuss iGaming, are there any specific trends that you see gaining momentum and being discussed at the moment?

Omnichannel is one major trend and everybody loves to talk about omnichannel, but it's so bloody difficult to do. I would also say that iGaming is becoming more and more social every day, so the second big trend I see is that social element in real money casinos with features such as tournaments, joint player approaches, and so on. 

This trend will continue because younger players do not want to play an isolated slot by themselves. They love to interact. They just love to communicate about what they are doing as many times as possible - in particular if they win. That's why social trends such as tournaments and sharing results will continue.

Artificial Intelligence is another major topic being discussed in iGaming. What's your take?

Already 11 years ago, before I joined the Merkur Group, I worked for a German family office - it was an AI company. Those days, it was not always called artificial intelligence. Those days it was mathematics. I have a research background, and we spoke about neural networks at the time. That trend started a long time ago. 

Now we can see that AI is unstoppable. Also in gambling, of course. You can see various applications. It helps increase efficiency because if you take AI-empowered front ends with recommendation engines, it can drive revenues. On the other hand, AI becomes more and more important when it comes to player protection, helping detect if somebody has some, let's say, dangerous player behaviors.

A third area is sports betting, helping create your offering, with the odds, and so on. I was already working with this technology some 11 years ago. But now I see it all coming over and entering gambling, and it's unstoppable.