Florida-based gaming and hospitality company Hard Rock International has expanded its sports betting operation beyond New Jersey with Friday’s launch of over-the-counter betting at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Sioux City in Iowa.
Hard Rock’s new sportsbook at its Sioux City property is powered by European gaming and sports betting technology provider Gaming Innovation Group (GiG). The two companies teamed up last year to launch together a physical and digital sportsbook at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Atlantic City.
The partnership between Hard Rock and GiG came with the option to be extended across multiple other states where sports betting is legal.
Iowa legalized athletic gambling earlier this year. The Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission authorized in August the state’s 19 casinos to offer retail, online, and mobile sports betting to customers aged 21 or over and located within the state’s borders.
Hard Rock Sioux City joined the state’s sports betting scene just over a month after the first legal bet was accepted on the territory of the state. According to official numbers posted by the state gambling regulator last week, Iowa’s sportsbooks handled $8,576,246 in bets during the first 17 days of regulated sports betting in the state through August 31, and generated $2,161,688 in revenue.
Over-the-counter Betting Now Live at Hard Rock Sioux City, Mobile Betting Coming in Q4
Hard Rock debuted its Sioux City retail sportsbook at 3 pm local time on Friday. The operator has designated more than 400 square feet of space for the betting facility and it features four betting windows for customers. Hard Rock and GiG revealed that they plan to launch online and mobile betting at some point in the fourth quarter of the year.
GiG said that the launch of sports betting in Iowa with Hard Rock enables the company to leverage its platform across the US and add more scale to its network. The gambling technology provider expects limited impact on its revenue in 2019 from its entry into Iowa’s sports betting market and that the contribution will increase from the launch of online and mobile betting in 2020 onwards.
Of their recent expansion into another US state, GiG Chief Executive Officer Richard Brown said that they are delighted to deepen their relationship with Hard Rock and that this agreement is “both a testament to our know-how and prowess to lead a land-based casino into the digital world of betting, and a strong validation of GiG’s commercial and product delivery capabilities.”
Hard Rock Sioux City General Manager Jim Franke added that their new GiG-powered sportsbook provides their players and guests with a new level of engagement and that they “couldn’t be more thrilled to be launching in Iowa.”
Iowa has population of approximately 3.2 million inhabitants. The state’s sports betting market is also expected to benefit with visitors from neighboring Nebraska and Minnesota where the practice is not legal.
According to early projections, Iowa’s sportsbooks can produce revenue of around $160 million at market’s maturity.
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