Supplier Supplement: iGaming’s biggest 2025 achievements, geolocation and finding a niche

Welcome to The Supplier’s Supplement by SBC Media, shining a light on some of the most interesting and thought provoking industry commentary from suppliers throughout the week. Each week, SBC Media’s Craig Davies, Charlie Horner and Fernando Noodt will walk through the quotes, highlight the stories that matter most and offer thoughts on how supplier voices are contributing to some of iGaming’s biggest talking points. 

Year in Review

The festive season is getting closer and closer but here at SBC we are still going strong – and so are our partners. But as we begin to think about closing for the Christmas season it is an opportune moment to take a step back and reflect on some of the biggest achievements of 2025 and look forward to the opportunities that 2026 bestows. 

Tom Light, CEO of FIRST, has enjoyed a successful, award-laden 2025 that has been focused on the opening year of Brazil’s newly regulated sports betting framework.

Light told SBC News that the hard work put in during 2025 and prior is now paying off, noting: “In Brazil, our goal is simple: remain the dominant sportsbook partner – not by volume alone, but by quality and longevity. We want to be the sportsbook behind the brands that define regulated sports betting in the country. 

“In 2026, you’ll see more of our personalisation engine, more modular innovations like GMFY (gamification), and expansion of our NEXLVL content layer – which is already proving to be a game-changer in Gen Z engagement.” 

Meanwhile, Amusnet has produced plenty of new titles throughout 2025 and the supplier’s PR Manager Silviya Petrova summed up the productive nature of the year gone by. 

“Amusnet advanced its gaming ecosystem by prioritising flexibility, interactivity, and tighter cross-vertical integration.

“The year saw the expansion of Amusnet’s jackpot and promotional systems for Online Casino with the introduction of Golden Coins Link and the Cash Bomb. These tools enhance player retention and session duration by creating spontaneous reward moments across a broad portfolio of games, further aligning operator strategies with evolving player preferences.”

Fazi iGaming Director Ivica Jovanovski has also reflected on 2025, outlining that it has been a landmark year for the studio which has taken advantage of the numerous global opportunities in various markets.

He said: “We have increased our distribution network and strengthened our performance in key regions – including Latin America, Africa, and several European markets. Africa, in particular, remains one of our strongest-performing territories.

“Our ambition for 2026 is to fully transition from a strong tier-2 supplier into what I call the Champions League level of the industry.

“We plan to achieve this through several strategic directions. Strong regulatory expansion will be achieved via South Africa and Austria where player preferences in these markets fit exceptionally well with our game style. Our goal is to position Fazi among the top five suppliers once these markets open for certification.”

Tech Corner

As new markets regulate and become legal, geolocation has perhaps never been so important to ensure that operators are compliant and only offering their products to those who are legally allowed to. 

But geolocation provider GeoLocs warned that the tech can’t be too cumbersome and get in the way of the user experience. 

“Most players don’t think about geolocation at all. They just want to place a bet. But poor UX around permissions, unclear messaging, and clunky location requests can create the impression of restrictive ‘compliance friction.’ Retail apps solved the UX battle a decade ago. iGaming is catching up.”

iGaming is catching up in some ways, but in others it is leading the charge of innovation. With the rise of prediction markets, gamification tools and more, iGaming is at the heart of user retention and with some of these shifts operators need to continue to adopt new solutions to avoid falling behind. 

As Elantil’s Chief Product Officer Clyde Vassallo said: “Experiences are richer, more dynamic, and more personalised, and the truth is that the technology platform solutions providers had been building up until this point hadn’t actually been designed with any of these developments in mind.

“Because Elantil was built at this exact moment in the industry’s evolution, we had the advantage of designing for today’s challenges, not yesterday’s assumptions.”

Innovation can only happen when a company finds a niche and presents the solution and one company who believes it has found a new niche is Onlyplay with the introduction of its Tap Games. 

iGaming Expert sat down with the company’s Head of Partnerships, Anna Serheieva, who said: “We noticed a clear gap between traditional slot mechanics and what modern players actually wanted. Most casino games were either too passive, too slow, or overloaded with complex features. 

“Today’s audience expects something more interactive, immediate, and rewarding – and that’s how tap games were born.

The concept first came to life through Piggy Tap, our flagship multiplayer tap game where players smash the piggy bank together and share the prize pool.”