Entain secures first online poker licences in Germany

Approved by the State Administrative Office of Saxony-Anhalt, Entain was issued a total of five licences, with two of these allowing Entain to operate online poker via its Bwin and Ladbrokes brands.

The other three licences will permit Bwin and Ladbrokes, as well as Sportingbet, to offer igaming throughout the country.

All five of the new licences will run for a period of five years and are in addition to Entain’s existing licences to offer online sports betting in Germany under each brand.

“We’re delighted to now have our licences for gaming and poker services in the regulated German market, enabling us to offer and market them to our customers,” Entain’s chief governance officer Robert Hoskin said. 

“It is an important and welcome step towards achieving the goal of a fully regulated online betting and gaming market in Germany. Only through such regulation and its enforcement will we avoid the reality of customers going to the black market where there are none of the safeguards that reputable operators such as Entain guarantee.”

The latest licences come after German-state owned casino Sächsische Spielbanken earlier this month became the first state casino operator in the country to secure an online slots licence.

The operator, which has a monopoly on the land-based casino sector in the state of Sachsen, will offer online slots to players in Germany via the Sachsenlotto.de website.