HiQ develops real-time betting software for Veikkaus, the Finnish national lottery
HiQ has been helping Veikkaus to develop Live Betting, a gaming concept enabling sports fans to bet in real time on sport events such as football matches. Live Betting is a new feature for the OnNet Gaming Platform that Veikkaus has developed in cooperation with HiQ. Live Betting was commercially launched during November 2004.
“Sports betting and Internet gaming are becoming increasingly popular and HiQ possesses unique skills in the area of Internet gaming, skills that are increasingly sought after. We are of course very happy to continue our positive cooperation with Veikkaus,” says Anssi Rantanen, deputy managing director of HiQ Softplan. The Live Betting component enables a gaming administrator to open and close new betting targets in real time, set the odds and control the game. Once a betting target is closed and the result is known, the outcome is communicated to the players – again in real time. Through Live Betting players can place their bets either via a web browser or using their WAP-enabled mobile phone. Payment for the bets will be debited from and prizes credited to the player’s OnNet account in real time. In 1996 Veikkaus was the first national lottery in the world to start Internet gaming, using the OnNet system. OnNet is Finland’s largest e-commerce site for consumers and gives consumers the opportunity to play various games of chance and skill, such as Lotto, Keno and various forms of sports betting. HiQ has been working closely with Veikkaus on the development of the OnNet Interactive Gaming Platform since 1996. HiQ has also been working to adapt OnNet for the Swedish lottery company Folkspel and the Dutch national lottery De Lotto, which have licensed OnNet from Veikkaus. For further information, please contact: Lars Stugemo, President and CEO, HiQ International, tel.: +46 (0)8-588 90 000 Anssi Rantanen, Deputy MD, HiQ Softplan, tel.: +358 9 4355 8631 Annika Larsson, CIO HiQ International, tel.: +46 (0)8-588 90 015