Evolution Gaming, now Evolution, was named the Online Casino Supplier of the Year at the 2020 Global Gaming Awards. This year, it looks like they are set to become the world’s leading live and online casino supplier. Let’s take a closer look at this dominating force in the casino industry:
From The Beginning
Evolution Gaming was first launched in 2006. From the get-go, Evolution Gaming set out to revolutionise the European live dealer space. It’s something they rapidly did, quickly becoming a leading B2B live casino service provider, to the point where they were working with more top-tier operators than any of their competitors.
In 2012 Evolution Gaming launched their mobile gaming offering and in 2013 they added the 100th live table at their Riga studios. This made Evolution the largest single-site casino operation in Europe. In 2017 the brand pioneered the live game shows with the launch of Dream Catcher and by 2018 they were ready for expansion outside of Europe.
In this year they acquired Ezugi and launched a production hub in Georgia and their first live casino studio in New Jersey in the United States. In 2019, the brand further demonstrated their power in the industry through their expansion of the game show category due to the addition of their exclusive Monopoly Live and Deal offerings.
Evolution Acquires NetEnt
Late last year Evolution Gaming proposed a buyout deal of another online gambling development giant, NetEnt. The buyout deal, which Evolution Gaming had previously expected to close on the 2nd of November 2020, finally came to fruition in December.
It sees the company take its total shareholding in the Stockholm-listed casino games developer NetEnt to 96.8%. Evolution Gaming has offered 0.1306 shares for each share in NetEnt bring the total value to SEK 19.6bn for all. The offer from Evolution Gaming effectively NetEnt’s share price by 43% compared to their closing price on the Nasdaq Stockholm as of the end of June 2020.
Looking To The Future
Evolution Gaming showed strong financial growth in 2020 with revenue figures for the second quarter of 2020 growing by 48% compared to 2019. The growth was primarily due to an increased demand for strong online casino products as land-based casinos and retail venues remained closed. In the same year, Evolution also acquired the Red Tiger brand. 2020 also saw Evolution open two new state-of-the-art live casino studios. These were launched in Pennsylvania in North America and Lithuania. 12 new titles were also released by the brand in 2020, including the bonus-packed Crazy Time.
Along with being named the Online Casino Supplier of the Year, providing the best real money online pokies around, the brand was also awarded double victory at the Gaming Intelligence Awards where they were crowned Casino Supplier of the Year and winning Game of the Year with their Monopoly Live title.
Their strong growth in the industry along with the recent acquisition of NetEnt means the Evolution brand is well positioned to further expand their brand in the United States market in the coming months.