Online casino industry to grow rapidly by 2014

LONDON, England -- (PRESS RELEASE) -- iGaming Business, key provider of intelligence for the online gambling industry, has announced the launch of a new report looking at the rise and growth of the online casino industry. The Global Business of Online Casinos is reporting on one of the most established online gambling sector, which has recently become the topic du jour, with the recession leaving many looking for alternative sources of income and international regulators yielding to a freer gambling market. The report clearly demonstrates that by the end of 2010, the online casino market will be worth $4.7bn globally in terms of gross gaming yield. It will rise to $5.8bn by the end of 2012 and to $7.1bn by the end of 2014 in terms of gross gaming yield, which is an increase of nearly 79% from 2009. This will naturally generate a lot of interest in The Global Business of Online Casinos, which not only tracks recent trends and strategies of successful online casino operators, but gives a step by step history of the industry and statistics on starts-ups and expanding enterprises. For example, according to industry insiders, online casinos cost an average of $1.5m in start-up costs but need very few employees compared with their land-based counterparts that can cost $300m to set up and keep operational. Equally large non-gambling brands such as media owners looking to diversify into other markets or to monetise existing online content may follow the example of the Virgin Group and Sky in the UK and choose to enter the online gaming space through launching their own online casinos. "Each online casino operator is looking to participate in a sector becoming more socially acceptable, benefiting from a liberalised regulatory structure in some markets, and enjoying very substantial growth across many key demographics including those that have been hard to reach through other types of gaming or betting such as women." Reports the author of The Global Business of Online Casinos; Rachael Church-Sanders "Add to that the growth in social networking, mobile apps and microtransactions and times that by the growing number of people globally with broadband connections and wireless access, the future certainly looks rosy for online casino." So where is the future of online casinos heading? Industry consensus is that the casinos that will thrive will provide a wider variety of games. Given the internet's viral nature, something new will always come along. However, as well as looking for the next 'killer app', familiar games such as roulette will always make for suitable online casino games because they are played by thousands of people around the world and are easy to get to grips with - characteristics that tend to be common among the most popular online games. The rise of social networking sites, applications, social-based games and smart-phones has many operators integrating these new developments into their marketing strategies. Whether individual online casino operators succeed however will come down to their ability to attract and retain paying customers who are increasingly getting younger, or from the growing pool of non-core gaming players.