With new sports betting options in Canada right around the corner, there’s no shortage of interest in tackling the expanded market. Provinces are gearing up for a launch that will happen soon, and the British Columbia Lottery Corp. (BCLC) is ready. It has tapped Genius Sports as its official data provider, a significant win for both entities.
Genius Sports Comes to the BCLC
Genius Sports already has its hands in a lot of sports betting operations across North America and the rest of the world, and is adding more coverage with its new partnership with the BCLC. It has signed a multi-year agreement to supply its LiveData and LiveTrading platforms, as well as its other betting solutions, to the gaming operator. With single-event bets coming sometime this fall, Genius Sports and the BCLC are moving quickly to get everything in place.
Asserts Genius Sports CEO Mark Locke, “BCLC’s partnership with Genius Sports demonstrates how the nascent Canadian sports betting industry already recognizes the importance of official data in helping to protect consumers whilst delivering the most secure and compelling products for their customers.” He adds that the BCLC will have a “competitive advantage” with the company’s tools and that Genius Sports is going to help Canada become the multibillion-dollar market it’s expected to be.
Canada’s Big Move Into Sports Betting
It was only a matter of time before Canada expanded its legal sports betting market. Watching what was taking place in its neighbor to the south, the country’s lawmakers realized that changes were needed if they wanted to capitalize on the potential revenue benefits of new betting options. The alternative would have been to watch the Canadian dollars continue to slip across the border into the US or other jurisdictions. It took a change to the country’s criminal laws to make it happen, but Canadian sports bettors will soon have more options to choose from as soon as the light turns green.
Canada’s five provincial lottery corporations – Atlantic Lottery, the BCLC, Loto-Québec, Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) and Western Canada Lottery Corporation – are all able to introduce the new sports betting choices, with British Columbia (BC) and Ontario expected to be the two provinces that receive the most action. BC is home to the Vancouver Canucks of the NHL and several other sports teams, and the city of Vancouver is the third-largest in Canada. Ontario, for its part, hosts a number of major sports teams, mostly in Toronto. These include the Toronto Maple Leafs in the NHL, the Toronto Blue Jays in MLB and the Toronto Raptors in the NBA.