Wilson Fang, chief executive officer of Winn Tech Inc., said the Philippine offshore gaming industry still has huge opportunities despite more reasonable but stricter regulations implemented by regulators.

The CEO of remote slot solutions provider Winn Tech noted in an interview with AGB that new regulations for the Philippine offshore gaming industry are “better at compliance and regulatory standards to show better transparency.” He believes regulation is crucial to ensuring further growth in the industry.

Winn Tech is the country’s first remote slot solution provider under REMOTE PLAY operations and received certification from PAGCOR last April. Fong shared that he started the company with the vision of serving a specific market and looking for products with greater integrity.

As of January 2024, Winn Tech has partnered with four casinos, including Rizal Park Hotel & Casino, D’Height Casino, Heritage Casino and Royce Hotel & Casino in the Philippines, with RPSM (Remote Slot Machine) systems. So far, offshore gambling customers come from South and Northeast Asia, with some coming from Europe and Latin America.

This offline-to-online (O2O) business model differs from traditional online gaming because Winn Tech purchases physical machines from lab-tested slot machine manufacturers. Fang said physical machines can be controlled via gadgets or smartphones, while electronic games use the RNG software of virtual slot machines. The two are completely different concepts in terms of technology and target market.

Wilson Fang believes that machine availability is a key factor in the business, as the business model relies on volume, popular machine games and dynamic user interfaces. Against this backdrop, Fang plans to have 1,000 REMOTE slot machines by the second quarter of 2024.

Regarding future growth, Fang explained that from a revenue perspective, the WUD (win per unit per day) of traditional slot machines in the Philippines is approximately US$350, which Winn Tech expects to achieve by increasing machine utilization from 65% to approximately US$450. 82%.

In this context, Fang emphasized that the stability and reliability of PAGCOR and the current regulatory environment provide clear direction for targets and compliance.

On the other hand, Fang believes that the Philippines will undoubtedly become the largest gaming growth market this year. Meanwhile, as regulators allow innovation and operators continue to develop the online space, the remote gaming licensing regime has put the Philippines' gaming market well ahead of ASEAN countries. This is on top of the REMOTE PLAY license variants that cater to specific markets such as slots and poker.

He recalled that the Cambodian gambling regulator mentioned the possibility of developing an online gambling industry, which also proves that the Philippine market has a certain leading advantage in this regard.

Winn Tech CEO: Philippine offshore gaming still has huge potential.

Although the market appears to be on the verge of an uptick, Winn Tech still faces some challenges.

In the same interview, Fong noted that illegal slot machine operations in Southeast Asian countries pose some challenges, as “these operators can offer players higher prices without complying with tax regulations, purchasing genuine slot machines, or complying with any local authorities. commission or rebate programs. This puts us at a competitive disadvantage.”

Fang mentioned that the company has requested tax relief from PAGCOR due to rising marketing costs associated with offshore operations. Currently, the Philippines has a relatively high online gross gaming revenue (GGR) tax rate, while some European countries only impose a tax rate of 5% to 10% on GGR.

According to the Department of Finance, the Philippine government raised approximately P8.8 billion in tax revenue from POGOs in 2022. The total is divided into POGO taxes (P4.35 billion) and gaming taxes (P3.65 billion).

With expected business growth on the horizon, Winn Tech hopes to capitalize on gaming's next big wave. Winn Tech is an alternative product that fills the void of integrity that online gaming seems to lack in certain areas of the World Wide Web, and could effectively repurpose unused areas of land-based casinos. Available today in the future.