KPMG has announced the speaker lineup for the fifth in its series of Gibraltar eGaming summits, due to take place at the Sunborn Hotel, Gibraltar on 23rd and 24th April, 2015.

Now established as one of the industry’s key thought leadership events, the 2015 summit features an evolution of the traditional programme to this year include expert presentations, IMGL master-classes and panel sessions from the cutting edge of eGaming, as well as payments, data analytics, digital currencies and the potential of the blockchain, becoming in the process the KPMG eSummit. The event is free to attend and is once again expected to attract over 200 key stakeholders, leading licensed and unlicensed sector delegates, and representatives of government and international regulatory oversight bodies, with around half of these travelling to Gibraltar to attend.

The Hon. Albert Isola, Minister for Financial Services and Gaming for the Gibraltar Government will begin day one’s proceedings with an opening address, after which Gibraltar’s Gambling Commissioner and moderator Phill Brear will be joined by regulatory and legislative experts Peter Howitt, Peter Isola, Sir Peter Caruana, QC and Peter Montegriffo to discuss the review of gambling regulation in Gibraltar.

Preston Byrne of distributed-application developers Eris Industries will present on the Blockchain 2.0 during the morning coffee break before MasterCard’s Andrew Johnstone joins panelists Kriya Patel, Tony Craddock, Tom Cregan and Dani Spier to tackle emerging payments and their role in eCommerce.

Following a lunch break kindly sponsored by Gibraltar law firm Isolas, moderator Peter Howitt of the Gibraltar Betting and Gaming Association, together with Wanda Goldwag of Senet Group, Martina King of Featurespace, the Honourable Gilbert Licudi and Stephen Donoughue, will discuss the critical issue of social responsibility and gaming.

‘Red carnations and Slaying Dragons’ will then form the focus of the day’s next presentation, provided by Tim Stocks, Head of Corporate Finance at Taylor Wessing, after which Paul Lasok, QC will discuss fiscal neutrality and VAT.

Providing the final session of the day, Peter Montegriffo will return to the stage as moderator, where the conference regular will be joined by local gaming leadership to discuss the evolution of gambling from an operator’s perspective. Delegates are then invited to close a day’s fascinating discussions over drinks sponsored by Gibtelecom, followed by an invitation only Gala Dinner kindly hosted by the Government of Gibraltar.

Throughout day one, delegates are also invited to break away from the main programme and take part in a selection of break-out sessions, which provide a more intimate forum in which to discuss the key industry issues. Following its success as part of the 2014 Isle of Man eGaming Summit in November, KPMG is very pleased to announce the return of the International Masters of Gaming Law (IMGL), which this year will offer two specialist panel sessions. IMGL President Dr. Joerg Hofmann will bring together a distinguished group of gaming lawyers from throughout Europe to first discuss the M&A environment and then gaming from a European Legal Viewpoint.

Also featured as part of the break-out sessions are a GBGA workshop, chaired by the Senet Group’s Wanda Goldwag and Ron Finley on the topic of responsible gambling while the day’s final break-out session will see a commercial workshop on the topic blockchain technologies, crypto-currencies and FinTech featuring Preston Byrne, Siân Jones, Joey Garcia and Anthony Provasoli.

Building upon the first day’s discussions, day two’s is a morning only programme and will once again invite delegates to the Sunborn’s conference suite. The opening panel will see Phill Brear, Jenny Williams of the UK Gambling Commission, Haken Hallstedt of the Swedish Gambling Authority hold a truly international panel discussion on the evolution of gaming, this time from a regulator’s perspective. Paul Leyland of Regulus Partners will then return to present on the topic of the multi-channel value equation before introducing the final presentation of the 2015 summit, during which Martina King and Featurescape’s David Excell will discuss predicting customer behaviour with data analytics, giving an insight into their recent work with the Responsible Gambling Trust.

Commenting on the programme’s announcement, Managing Director Micky Swindale said: “One of the eGaming industry’s most exciting qualities is its application at the very cutting edge of things. EGaming is constantly breaking new ground in multi-lateral regulation, legislation and consumer protection mechanisms, as well as technologies ranging from development and device platforms to encryption, anti-fraud and payments. This has become increasingly apparent with the population of every eGaming summit series programme, so this year KPMG decided to embrace the fact with an even more varied event. Our lineup of speakers is second to none, and sure to invite some fascinating discussion. We are very much looking forward to welcoming all aboard the Sunborn this month.”

More information can be found at www.kpmg.gi/esummit. If you would like to request an invitation, please contact the KPMG Gibraltar office on +3500 200 48600 or Abby Kimber on [email protected] – registration closes on Friday 17th April.