| | |  | Last Updated: Tuesday, June 19, 2007 |  | | | Study Projects Mobile Gambling Growth in Asia
- Monday, 28 Nov 2005
The Asian market has long been a destination coveted by online gambling operators wishing to expand their reach into the Far East. China has probably the biggest earning potential, considering its vast population. There have been a few successful attempts from the part of online gambling operator who managed gain ground in Asia. Just recently, BetonSports online gambling group managed to land a deal that would enable the company to run online sports gambling services in the Philippines. However, a new study revels that the main reason why online gambling hasn’t spread to the same extent it has in west is because online casino operators have been targeting the wrong market.
Instead of pushing internet gambling, the online casinos operators should have targeted mobile gambling. The same reason that slows the spread of mobile gambling throughout the rest of the western world is not applicable in Asia. What has been holding mobile gambling back is the lack of affordable mobile devices that are suitable to run mobile gambling applications. In Asia, especially in Japan, the market is flooded with top-of-the-line PDA’s and cell phones that are extremely cheap. On the flip side, with all this technological advancement, internet access not equally common.
An independent research firm by the name of IDC has recently revealed the result of a study indicating that mobile gambling is primed to experience steady growth well into 2009. IDC analyst Jun-Fwu Chin explains, “As mobile penetration in the region continues to rise, and as users continue to demand more feature-rich media, mobile online gaming will continue to experience growth”. Chin adds saying, “Malaysia will see the number of mobile online game users grow at a compounded annual rate of over 70 percent from 2004 to 2009. Singapore and China will see users grow at a rate of around 60 pct in the same period”.
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