Betsson Malta Ltd, an international gaming company established in Malta since 2006, has launched an annual student award that focuses on recognising achievement in gaming research. A cash prize will be given to the best gaming-related dissertation. It is open to both current students and alumni of the University of Malta.

To be eligible, the applicant must have submitted their dissertation as part of their work towards a university degree at the University of Malta. Dissertations from all disciplines are welcome as long as the research relates in some way to gaming. The winner will be announced in September and given a €1,500 cash prize.

For the very first edition of The Betsson Gaming Award, submissions of all dissertations relating to gaming, irrelevant of which year they were approved and graded by the University of Malta, are welcome. All submissions must be sent in soft copy (in pdf format) together with a single page document providing the participant's contact details and explaining the contribution of the dissertation to the field of gaming.

The Malta Lotteries and Other Games Act (2001) defines gaming as "a game for money and, or prizes with a monetary value, the results of which are not totally accidental but depend, to a certain extent on the skill of the participant".

"We are always considering to adopt good new business practices, and if some of the researchers now would come up with something really good, I would be very happy to adopt it!" Magnus Silfverberg, chief executive officer of Betsson Malta Ltd, told i-Tech.

Mr Silfverberg was asked to shed more light on current trends in gaming and betting.

"From an industry perspective, one of the hottest trends right now is B2B (business to business), I would say. A lot of operators, including Betsson, have started their B2B divisions in order to reach out to more customers via partnerships. From an industry perspective, the effects of the B2B movement would be a very interesting research subject.

"From a consumer perspective, one of the biggest trends right now is live betting. We see a huge shift in the betting patterns from pre-match betting to live betting. It is of course interesting to study what kind of effects this will have on gaming behaviour and to the gaming companies. Another interesting trend is of course the mobile trend, which for us means starting to offer our games on the cell phones as a complement to the PC or laptop. Betsson is currently offering mobile sports betting and we are looking into more games to follow. It is interesting to understand how this change will affect consumer behaviour, now that you can bet from anywhere, anytime!"

Betsson's sponsorship of the awards falls within the company's social responsibility strategy. The betting company is working in association with the University of Malta and has the support of the Malta Lotteries and Gaming Authority (LGA). The Malta University Student Council (KSU) is helping to raise awareness of the award amongst students.

The deadline for submissions for the 2010 award is July 9 and these must be sent to the e-mail address: studentawardmalta@betsson.com.

More information is available from Hillevi Stuhrenberg, manager for responsible gaming and corporate social responsibility at Betsson, on e-mail: hillevi.stuhrenberg@Betsson.com

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