Dear iGaming Daily listeners,

Welcome to the first episode of iGaming Daily’s limited series, Dear CEO, in partnership with iGP.

This monthly podcast feature, fronted by SBC’s Media Manager, Charlie Horner, and iGP’s CEO, Jovana Popovic Canaki, will tackle some of the biggest topics facing operators within the iGaming space and answers the key questions that keep the operator community worrying about on a regular basis.

The first episode will see Jovana and Charlie tackle the topic of market dynamics and how to navigate certain hurdles when operating in certain jurisdictions.

Picking the right platform provider can be make or break for any operator, be it an established name or the next young up-start and Jovana detailed the key steps for a successful partnership between operator and platform provider.

“I look at the partnership between an operator and the platform provider as a marriage,” she told Charlie.

“First you start dating a person to understand whether it’s a good fit and we do the same. There’s a series of demos where an operator would understand what kind of product a company has and then they make a decision, that’s engagement, and then the marriage starts.

“It is important to put a lot of effort into understanding what is the best fit for the operator’s vision because no one is getting married to get divorced and in gaming terms divorce is migration, which can be a painful process.”

Like in a good marriage, Jovana continued, close collaboration is also needed between both parties to optimise the partnership. This is especially true in a field such as igaming which experiences rapid growth and spans regions from across the globe.

She said: “Operators are those that know their brands best. They know their players the best and the markets that they are putting these brands into. They are much closer to the local markets and to the local players than we are as a platform provider. So getting those insights back into the [platform provider] is of extreme importance because that’s where we learn through operators how to create a better solution.

“And it goes vice versa, platform providers, such as in iGP, constantly work on improving the technology to be able to provide and deliver a faster solution and better quality. So it always goes back and forth and it’s essential to keep that collaboration alive.”

A growing trend in the industry, especially among tier-one operators, is the demand for product exclusivity.

Reflecting on this desire from operators, Jovana suggests that exclusivity can cause the markets to “stagnate” as non-tier ones and startups struggle to compete, it can also at the same time help to drive innovation and create better quality products.

“As in many things, I think that the balance is what’s important,” she concluded. “This is exactly what we do at iGP. Working with our tier-one operators, we’d rather work together on giving them a unique solution [rather] than exclusive. So this is where, in my opinion at least, this balance is. Not as much exclusivity but more of a unique solution that would cater to the needs of that particular company.”

An unexpected igaming journey

In a bonus episode of the new series, Popovic Canaki shared how she began her career in igaming, which has seen her take up executive roles at Oryx Gaming (now Bragg Gaming Group), Aspire Global and now iGP.

“For me, it was a really pure chance,” she recalled. “My background is in finance. I actually got a job in the accounting department of one of the biggest producers of construction pipes [but] after my MBA I had four months and while that move was ongoing I got myself a job in the customer support department in an igaming [company].

“I was an operator at the time and I just loved it. It was the closest place that I got to players, to talk to them on a daily basis and understand [them]. From then on, it was a series of different operations jobs, I worked as a cashier, I worked as a risk manager and for quite a few years I was on the ground with the players.”

Elsewhere in the episode, Popovic Canaki also detailed her vision and goals for iGP in 2025 in her new role as the company’s CEO.