Jeff Gural, the owner of the Meadowlands Racetrack, entered the summer with no expectations regarding New Jersey regulated sports betting.
Now, after Meadowlands reported the strongest July among Garden State properties in terms of NJ sports betting revenue, Gural’s facility is on the brink of joining an exclusive club:
Meadowlands’ sports betting partner, FanDuel Sportsbook, could be nearing the launch of its mobile platform.
FanDuel Sportsbook going mobile?
During a phone call Wednesday, Gural hinted at finalizing the racetrack’s sports betting operation in time for football season. He mentioned how “the last piece of the puzzle” is installing self-bet terminals in October.
Then, Gural added the following:
“Hopefully online will be operational,” he said, “and we’ll have all of the areas of the facility that we plan to use for sports betting operational. That’s really what we’re focused on right now.”
Gural’s statement is not earth-shattering news, though it does provide some perspective on FanDuel Sportsbook’s strides toward mobile wagering.
Plans already in place to go mobile
Last month, FanDuel Group, the new American arm of Paddy Power Betfair, partnered with GAN. The B2B gaming software supplier announced at the time that it “is preparing to launch Internet sports betting in New Jersey for FanDuel.”
Several “highlights” of the announcement included:
- The GAN platform will integrate FanDuel Group’s sports betting software.
- There will be a FanDuel-branded website and mobile app.
- Sports betting will be showcased as an “integrated extension” of GAN’s software platform. Moreover, GAN will “participate in the incremental sports betting revenues.”
“Online sports betting ‘go-live’ preparations for FanDuel are well advanced,” GAN CEO Dermot Smurfit said in the release, “and we remain confident in launching integrated sports betting alongside our existing Internet casino later this year.”
Prior to the GAN partnership, FanDuel Group teamed with IGT, whose technology is used at Meadowlands. At the time of the announcement, IGT noted a “FanDuel Sportsbook-branded online and mobile wagering” app using IGT technology was planned.
An exclusive club being created
Since mobile sports betting went live in mid-July, several casinos and companies have begun plans for launching mobile sports betting operations. One has already done so.
DraftKings Sportsbook launched its app last week to become the first sportsbook outside of Nevada to hit the mobile market.
That came a week after MGM Resorts International announced its intentions to roll out its playMGM sports betting app by Aug. 4. (It has yet to do so.) Even Caesars Entertainment said it would be ready to merge its online casino with a mobile sportsbook via the Caesars Casino & Sports app, potentially by football season.
And just Wednesday, Resorts Atlantic City mentioned having its mobile sportsbook ready to roll by the end of September.
The NJ sports betting market continues to crowd, but there are plenty of vacancies online. Perhaps FanDuel Sportsbook, like its chief daily fantasy sports competitor DraftKings, will beat the seasoned casinos to the mobile market.