2023 GiH Conference announces new speakers
The 2023 Gaming in Holland Conference, which will take place June 8 at the national heritage site KIT Royal Tropical Institute in Amsterdam, has added several new speakers to its already impressive lineup.
The event will take place just in time to discuss and analyze sweeping new marketing restrictions – including some as-of-yet unpublished policy guidelines – that will enter into force July 1.
Confirmed speakers now include:
René Jansen, Chair of the Netherlands Gambling Authority
Fedor Meerts, Department Head Gambling, Ministry of Justice & Security
Pontus Lindwall, CEO of the Betsson Group
Anne-Jaap Snijders, CCO at Kindred Group
Malinda Miener, Chief Compliance Officer at Holland Casino
Justin Franssen, Managing Partner, Kalfff Katz & Franssen
Floor van Bakkum, Manager Prevention at Jellinek – Arkin
Lennart Kessels, GM Netherlands at Kindred Group
Robert Schouten, CEO of Betnation
Marc Smit, Country Manager Netherlands at Tombola
Steven Vrolijk, Founder of KVA
Frank op de Woerd, Co-Founder of CasinoNieuws
And many more!
The full conference agenda is available here.
As always, the Gaming in Holland Conference is THE place to meet key stakeholders and decision makers in the Dutch regulated gambling sector.
The event will conclude with a boat ride through Amsterdam's picturesque canals and networking drinks at Holland Casino Amsterdam.
Don't miss it! Register today: https://bit.ly/GiH2023
Key members of Kindred's executive team to step down
Following a strategic review of the company, four members of Kindred's executive team, including long-serving CEO Henrik Tjärnström, have now stepped down or announced their resignation effective this fall.
Among those who will step down this fall is Kindred's Chief Commercial Officer, Anne-Jaap Snijders. According to a company statement, Snijders's departure is unrelated to the resignation of Kindred's CEO and CFO. No changes will be made in the local NL team.
Snijders: “I had a great time at Kindred. It has been a fantastic journey working out of the Sydney, Malta and Amsterdam office with extremely talented colleagues.
“The pinnacle was to receive the Dutch license and building up market leadership with the local teams.”
Meanwhile, Kindred Group founder Anders Ström has given an explosive interview to Swedish financial newspaper Dagens industri, explaining some of the background of this spate of resignations (English summary here).
“It has been clear that what the board wants to do and what Henrik wants to do are not in agreement with each other,” Ström said referring to the strategic review which has seen Kindred begin exploring options for a sale – in part or in full – of the business.
Ström also revealed that the decision to enter a strategic review was driven by Kindred’s largest single shareholder, activist investment group Corvex Management, which owns 15% of the company.
Finally, Kindred's attempts to enter the US market and its plans to develop its own sportsbook caused the company to spread itself too thin, Ström added.
Considering its relatively modest size, a sale would be the best option – something that Ström already advocated prior to his stepping down as chairman of the company in 2021.
“It's time to fight back.” VideoSlots takes aim at €9.9m Netherlands Gambling Authority fine
Ewout Wierda, General Counsel at VideoSlots, once again took aim against the €9.9m fine issued by the Netherlands Gambling Authority late last year for offering online gambling in the country without a license.
According to Wierda, the Dutch regulator's fine was improper because the Netherlands could not be selected as a country of residence during the registration process.
According to the Dutch regulator, however, bets placed from a Dutch IP address and payments made from a Dutch bank account were still being processed. Additionally, VideoSlots briefly displayed the KSA logo on its website, thus claiming to be in possession of a Dutch remote license.
Currently, the videoslots.com domain can no longer be reached from the Netherlands.
14% of Dutch adults gambled online in the past 12 months
In the past twelve months, 14% of Dutch adults participated in online games of chance – up from 11% in the preceding period. Of these players, no less than 94% played with licensed operators.
The number of young adult players had grown since 2022, with the percentage now standing at 30% compared to 21% in the previous year.
These are some of the headline findings of the NOGA Online Gambling Barometer 2023, which surveyed a representative sample of almost 3,000 adults on their behavior and attitudes regarding online gambling.
Less positively, two thirds of surveyed players indicated that they did not know how to distinguish between licensed and unlicensed operators.
Peter-Paul de Goeij, Managing Director of the Netherlands Online Gambling Association (NOGA) commented: “It is good that the positive effects of legalization and market regulation are becoming increasingly visible. Even so, it is still too easy for unsuspecting players to end up in the clutches of organized crime. Unlicensed operators still advertise online, for instance through major search engines.”
The full report is available here.
Other news
Dutch state-owned operators control one third of the country's online gambling market.
Evolution Gaming presents its new live casino games for 2023.
The Maltese government has proposed new legislation to shield Malta-licensed online operators from reimbursement claims, including those from EU nationals. In response, lawyers from Germany and Austria have lodged a complaint with the European Commission.
Player protection software companies Mindway AI and therapy provider AnonyMind have signed a partnership with the aim of helping problem gamblers.
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