With “regtech” becoming a buzzword in the gaming industry, it’s not surprising that Earnings & More tapped a Denver-based company specializing in regulation technology as one of its 10 companies to watch in the coming year.
Founded five years ago, Compliable got on the regtech radar via its work with FanDuel. In a case study Compliable makes available to prospective customers, the sports betting app sought Compliable’s help in automating the licensing process of employees that was bogging down their operations.
Compliable was able to create a solution that cut the time it took to license employees. Since then, the company has added other big-name clients.
Licensing process was slowing growth of FanDuel
As the FanDuel case study notes, “In 2019, there was a major gap in the market for an automated tech solution to address licensing. Compliable moved to build that solution.”
Greg Ponesse, chief revenue officer with Compliable, told PlayColorado the company was tasked with speeding up a process.
“Essentially, what we’re doing is streamlining the license management process. The big complexity of it is, if I’m an operator or a supplier, and I’m trying to get into regions as quick as possible, how do I mitigate the bottleneck?”
Ponesse said creating its brand of regulation technology for FanDuel came about to help that company with “their sheer growth and the complexities of trying to get licenses within the US.”
It can be time-consuming or expensive to comply with licensing requirements in multiple markets. Compliable realized that “80% of the information required is all the same.” The company created a system allowing it to gather information once. Then that information is populated through multiple licensing applications and renewals.
One stakeholder also described the licensing process as redundant, monotonous and not a good use of employees’ time.
Compliable was able to increase sevenfold the number of weekly licenses
Thanks to Compliable, FanDuel “was able to increase the size and frequency of employee cohorts they license and have also begun referring vendor and affiliate partners to the platform.”
Compliance helped FanDuel shave time off the average application. The process went from 97 minutes to 27 minutes. The number of employees they were able to license each week increased sevenfold.
Compliable has expanded its offerings to cover licensing for entities and C-level executives. It’s a complicated process, Ponesse said.
“As simplistic as the front end looks, the back end is very complex.”
Other sportsbooks have sought out Compliable
Today, Ponesse says that Compliable works “with the majority of the largest enterprise operators out there and as well as suppliers.” In addition to FanDuel, Bet365 and Fanatics Sportsbook are among the clients most sold on what they offer.
Compliable is entrusted with information and with processes that have previously been the domain of lawyers. The company has brought forth innovation that’s allowed it to be competitive in a space where ArdentSky has long been the standard bearer.
As the company’s chief regulatory officer, Justin Stempeck, told Compliance+More that Compliable has found its niche.
“The US online gambling space poses a constantly evolving challenge as new jurisdictions continue to legalize and those requirements must be accounted for in any solution.
“The proliferation of regtech is beginning to make an impact, particularly as the regulatory obligations have grown exponentially. At a certain point, manual resources like staff and simple spreadsheets are no longer capable of delivering the results necessary to excel at scale. There are few true compliance experts familiar with all of the requirements across every state that has now legalized online sports betting, so technology can and does serve a critical need at this time.”
Ponesse thinks that industry-wide awareness of regulatory challenges helped earn Compliable its recent accolades from Earnings & More.
“Regulatory technology is getting a lot of interest in the gaming space … now that the gaming industry is up and running, you’re starting to see regulators put more attention on kind of regulatory tack and responsible gaming. Why we’re getting attention is because we really help companies and operators streamline their process. Right now, profitability is super important for these companies, so how do they do more with less? How do they move as quickly as possible? How can they be most cost-effective? And really, that’s what our technology does; it really streamlines that process.”
