Siddharth Sharma, Head Infotech quote -GATO 2017 – (IAMAI)

Mr. Siddharth Sharma, Head of Corporate Strategy for Head Infotech (that owns and operates Ace2Three and Witty Games) shared his views on “Decoding game of skill and business opportunities” at “GATO 2017 – Gaming for Tomorrow” which had been organised by Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) on 21 December 2017 in New Delhi.

” Bringing more credibility to the industry – this is essential for sustainability of a high growth sector. The world needs to know who the operators are, what they stand for, how we have and will continue to implement high standards of integrity in how we operate and on the services offered to end users. Our industry needs to begin the movement of stricter self-regulation either through industry specific independent bodies or through established mediums as this will pave way for eventual regulation. Having said that, there are already a plethora of checks and balances that each of our companies have in place ranging from fairness in card distribution, ID verification, responsible gaming measures and ensuring that only real players have access to our platforms with the exclusion of employees accessing their respective operator’s platforms.

 Supports a large ecosystem – Digital marketers thrive on our industry as it is the focal point of customer acquisition. Banks, payment gateways and fintech operators also stand to gain as payment systems are critical to our businesses and there are several thousand transactions that take place across platforms on a daily basis. Other than this, the skill gaming industry itself employs over 5000 highly skilled professionals across the country.

 Focus of the businesses – The businesses are founded and run by technocrats and operate purely on an entertainment model and want to shake off the tag of a “vice” business. Significant majority of our respective players play for fun and a small segment plays for cash. Out of this small segment, the average monthly user spend is in the few hundreds which comprises a majority of our users. As India matures, so will its perceptions towards our businesses. That is our hope and that is what we are working towards in a responsible manner.  “