Sports tech betting firm looks to raise game

What is being billed as the world's first cryptocurrency peer-to-peer (P2P) sports betting platform has been launched to tap into a global market now valued at more than $50 billion (£37bn).

Paul Roach and Nick Jones are looking to score in a multi-billion market. Picture: Stewart Attwood

Mungoparc, which is headquartered in Edinburgh, has developed a blockchain-powered, P2P betting platform where users can bet on football games in the Premiership, SPL, La Liga, Champions League and Europa Cup among others with a range of cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin and Ethereum.

The launch comes ahead of this summer’s football World Cup in Russia and the Mungoparc site is optimised for the growing trend of multi-channel users, particularly those using smartphones – seen as the dominant channel in the near future.

It incorporates functionality likely to prove popular with fast-growing demographics in online sports betting including millennials who are moving away from more traditional methods of betting.

Mungoparc said it was actively looking at adding other areas such as cricket, tennis and eSports, which alone is expected to reach more than $1.6bn globally by 2020, to the site.

While UK online consumer spend on sports betting broke through the £3bn barrier in 2017 – with online betting worth over double that of over-the-counter (OTC) and football now as valuable as horseracing – international markets like Australia, the US, Singapore and Ireland exceed the UK in overall value and present further growth opportunities for the firm, particularly with the regulatory environment opening up in many territories.

The US recently relaxed its gambling laws, providing an opening for UK players into a multi-billion-dollar market.

The US Supreme Court struck down a federal law which bans gambling on individual sporting events. States will now be able to choose individually whether to legalise sports betting.

Mungoparc founder director Paul Roach said: “Traditional bookmaker owned betting sites are outdated with the odds stacked against users. We are aiming to fundamentally disrupt the market.

“We provide our players with an exciting and secure platform on which to challenge other users’ knowledge of sport but with a big difference – on the world’s first blockchain-powered, peer-to-peer betting exchange.

“We are positioned for a new, younger type of sports better and one who wants a gaming experience to be part of the offering.”

He added: “We’re literally betting big on blockchain and all the metrics point towards an upwards trajectory in both cryptocurrency use and sports betting. Rather than launching yet another coin, we accept all crypto coins and tokens.

“We know there are a massive amount of people unsure of how to spend their crypto and we think Mungoparc is going to give them a great destination.”

Investors in the founding team and product build to date include Galvanise Capital managing partner, Nick Jones, and a £1 million seed funding round is now in process.

The investment will fund accelerated product development to maintain “first mover advantage” as well as marketing, Mungoparc added.