Strike action at Evolution’s live casino studio in Georgia has been described as “stable” as the supplier’s CEO, Martin Carlesund, addressed the situation in a company investors call for Q3 2024.
Carlesund revealed that the Georgian studio – which is currently operating at around 60% capacity – will not return to full capacity after the strike due to “instability”.
Nonetheless, he added that with over 20 studios globally, they are able to offset lost capacity and limit the impact on their customers.
Carlesund stated that Evolution “fully supports” the right of workers to be part of a union, however after much dialogue with the union in Georgia he described their demands as “simply unreasonable”.
He went on to accuse the unions and the media of spreading “a lot of disinformation and blunt lies”, emphasising the importance of them acting in line with legislation as well as union values.
One of the key falsehoods that Carlesund claimed had been spread was around the size of the strikes, as he stated around 300 staff were involved as it initially started, which caused minimal impact on the firm’s day-to-day operations.
This then escalated, according to Carlesund, when “a small number of non-employees and union activists illegally blocked the entrance to the workplace, behaving violently, vandalising the building and harassing working staff’, which caused “severe disruptions” and led to the “sad outcome” of them moving operations.
“Naturally the outcome of this is not positive for customers” said Carlesund, who added that he recently met with regulators in Georgia who “see through the situation with the unions and base their judgements on facts and not social media”.
Within the investors call, Carlesund also outlined some of the key products the studio has prepared for its partners, including the launch of Bet with Streamers Live.
Outlining an aim of “lifting excitement to new levels for players worldwide”, the title will allow players to bet along with influencers and streamers. Carlesund stated that this is an entirely new way to play” which will elevate the social offerings of Evolution’s partners’ online casino platforms.
Other new live casino products that Evolution expects will have a considerable impact in Q4 include Deal or No Deal Live, Bet Stacker Blackjack Live and Crazy Balls Live.
Remaining in Europe, Careslund described his excitement for a potentially “great” French market, however revealed that ghosts of French regulation have been around for a long time, yet look a lot more cemented at the moment.
Careslund also revealed that the firm’s revenue in Asia was significantly impacted by a steep rise in cyberattacks.
He underlined that these attacks had always been a threat, however there was an extensive and significant increase in these attacks in Q3. “The impact of these attacks is hard to quantify, but simply put, someone else is selling our product”, according to Carlesund.
Recovery in Asia from these cyberattacks won’t be a lightswitch, but will instead take a few quarters.
However, he lauded the regulator in the Philippines, as after “careful consideration” the firm took the step of bringing a studio to the region. Regulation of the Philippines market is something he believes could be a watershed moment for the Asian gaming industry.
Whilst the headwinds did impact the firm during the third quarter of the year, they did report total operating revenues increased year-on-year by 27.9% to €579m.
Net revenue increased by 14.7% to €519.4m fuelled by an increase in RNG for the firm as Carlesund emphasised he is “quite happy” with the firm’s Q3 results. EBITDA also grew by 30.3% to €415.3m.