March 30, 2010 (CAP Newswire) – 888’s Dragonfish gaming and bwin have decided to team up to break into the Italian Internet poker market and its five million-plus players. The two companies announced that bwin’s new Italian Ongame Network will be hosted by 888’s online gambling B2B service, Dragonfish.
Acquiring the Italian online gambling operator Gioco Digitale last year allowed bwin to engineer the Ongame Network for Italy. According to eGaming Review, this new network “pools the liquidity of BetPro.it, bwin, Casino di Venezia, Fast Poker, Gioco Digitale, Gmatica and SportingBet.it operators. … The pooling is enabled by the migration of all Italian licencees to Ongame Network’s P5 Poker Engine.”
Why an Italian-only network? Because the trend in European online gambling today is that states only allow online casinos within their borders, and are resisting cross-border online gambling brands. In Italy’s case, that means that foreign operators are allowed, but only if a special network is created that doesn’t allow players from outside Italy.
“Italy is Europe’s biggest online gambling market by revenue,” EGR adds. Read the EGR article here.
The news comes shortly after Jadestone had also announced a deal with Giaco Digitale. Read about that here.
Read more about bwin’s online gaming affiliate program here; read about 888’s affiliate program here.