Bwin Develops Social Networking
23rd October, 2009
The stereotypical gambler sits in smoky casinos amongst ‘tough guys’ chewing cigars and nursing whiskey. Online gamblers from the UK don’t quite fit this image however; players are increasingly getting into the spirit of their Vegas counterparts.
Bwin, one of the prime online gaming companies in the world with approximately 20million players across 22 countries is testing technology which allows players to interact in exactly the same way as they would in a real life Vegas casino.
The technology has been named, shoutbox. The software allows players to comment on bets and challenge friends on their buddy lists via Facebook and twitter. Bwin believe that developing the social side to online gaming is a key way of building their business for the future.
The business is also looking to address user generated content by developing a social software platform which will allow players to interact with one another. For example through instant messaging, buddy lists, presence services and alerts.
Kiessling feels that developing new products such as social networking is key to attracting gamblers making the switch to online.
"It's really the customer experience that's key. The customer churn is very important - anything around customer relationship management, customer intelligence, usability studies. That is a major priority for me,"
"My challenge is not a couple of million [euros] I spend on datacentres and server farms, not at all - that's number 60 of my priorities. My core challenge is time to market, output, development, productivity [and to] crank out new products," he continued
This is certainly a change of strategy for Bwin. Two years ago, Kiessling’s time was mostly spent dealing with infrastructure. However it is now estimated that 80% of his time is spent developing new products, improving enterprise architecture and finding the best talent in order to bolster the company's tech development.
By Faye
