Simon Liddle talks with Ted Robinson of Buzz Sports on the company's latest venture

IT is fitting that Headingley in Leeds, with its rich sporting tradition, is home to one of the UK’s fastest rising sports betting companies, Buzz Sports. Led by owner Rob O’Dea and chief operating officer Ted Robinson the company is not only aiming to establish itself within the highly competitive sports betting market but to broaden the sector’s overall reach through its innovative ZonePlay platform.

Fresh from a successful showing at G2E Las Vegas, Robinson, formerly a member of the executive team at Inspired Gaming, told InterGame that ZonePlay, rather than being a pure sports betting product, is an exciting new form of ‘sports entertainment’. This distinction, he said, is an important one.

"We don’t talk about odds, we don’t talk about percentages because we know from the focus groups we’ve done that non-bettors find that confusing. It puts them off," he said. "What we’re trying to do is to appeal to people who don’t normally bet; people who would never dream of having a Betfair or Bet365 account. This is entertainment for people who go to the pub to watch a game and say ‘I bet you they score from this corner.’ Those are the people who, if you give them a simple interface that shows them what they’ll win, will have a go."

ZonePlay is a ‘what happens next’ product that works in real time on live sports. The system’s interface provides the player with 10 to 12 zones, whether it’s a football pitch, tennis court, rugby field or any of the array of sports currently available or under development, allowing players to bet on what happens next from a corner in football, for example, or a run or wicket in cricket. In a typical football match, this creates more than 60 opportunities to bet. Both the stake and potential winnings are displayed clearly, without bombarding the player with confusing odds or percentages.

"When we launched it during the World Cup, we launched it in Belgium and saw that initially the average stake was around €1.50. That has now gone up to around €4-€4.50," Robinson said. "Within a soccer game we’re seeing between 70 and 80 betting events during the game. Obviously with cricket and tennis it’s every ball and every point, so there are considerably more opportunities to bet."

Based around BEToptions’ WAGERPlayer system, an Australian wagering system used by a number of large gaming groups, ZonePlay has been designed to enable Buzz to settle around 10,000 bets a second, while the opening and closing of markets can be completed in equally impressive time. This technical infrastructure, Robinson asserted, was a great starting point for further development. Behind the scenes, the company has a team of statisticians designing the various sporting models and traders who open, close and settle markets in real time.

"Obviously what makes ZonePlay work is the statistical model," Robinson continued. "You then put in the odds of that particular game and then you have the traders actively trading. The trader has the skills and technology to be able to tweak the model in real time. That means that if we have a particular problem in a game - let’s say its Real Madrid vs Barcelona and in the first half Real have two players sent off - it allows them to tweak the model so if Real were favourites, they’re not favourites any more."

Often simplicity is the key to the success of a product and in ZonePlay, Robinson believes the company has developed a really "revolutionary" product that is likely to attract customers and operators alike.

"What you have to bear in mind is that this is small stakes stuff. This, combined with being able to open and close markets a few seconds before an event takes place means you only need 10-15 seconds of the market to be open to place the bet because it is so intuitive. What we’re seeing people do in Belgium and in our focus groups is make not just one selection but a number of selections each time," he said. "You don’t have to be a tennis fan or a cricket fan to do it, you can very easily get a feel for it without being a huge fan. It makes even sports you don’t have much interest in come to life."

Buzz Sports is confident that ZonePlay will be perfectly suited to three business areas: retail, internet and mobile. For the retail sector, the company has developed a small terminal, known as Lola, that can sit neatly both in betting shops and bars. Players can load credit onto an RFID card and insert it into the terminal to begin playing. Here, however, there are regulatory and jurisdictional obstacles to overcome. In the UK, for instance, such terminals would only be permitted in betting shops.

"The betting shops in the UK are losing business," said Robinson. "They are losing business to the internet and other forms of betting. If you read the annual report of William Hill or of Ladbrokes, they’re all saying ‘we want to become a sports betting business, we want to become a destination venue.’ Unfortunately for them, there’s no reason for a customer to go to a betting shop other than to place a bet. It’s not a destination, its not somewhere you’d choose to go to watch the football. Now this product actually gives them the opportunity to make it a destination venue. There’s a lot more to it than that - they’re going to have to do their part, which is clearly putting in Sky Sports and making it an environment that you’re going to want to go and meet your friends and watch the football there. If they are serious about making it a real destination then our product allows them to do that."

Elsewhere, however, there is a great deal of potential for the installation of ZonePlay terminals in pubs and clubs, particularly in Europe and Australia. Should the law change, then India may also be a hugely lucrative market

"It really belongs in a bar," Robinson continued. "Currently we’re trading in bars in Belgium but unfortunately the law is changing in January so we’re not allowed to put it in there. We are, however, going to be able to put it in bars in Australia and there are other areas where we can put it in bars around the world. That, to me, is where the retail product lies. The trials that we’re now negotiating are with people where we will put it in bars."

Such is the strength of the product that it lends itself to a variety of sports. Additional sports models are currently under development and, having been rigorously tested, will be made available to the market. The football model has been completed and is already being traded, cricket and tennis will be released in the coming months and baseball and American football are in the early stages of design. Basketball is also in high demand, not just from potential US customers but from those in the Balkans too.

"We’ve just done a version of ice hockey because we’ve met with Canadians who said they would love to have it but we really need to have ice hockey," Robinson said. "What we have to do now is build up the model behind it."

With an average of more than 40 hours of live TV coverage of sport a week during betting shop opening hours, the demand for real time wagering opportunities is undoubtedly there. ZonePlay is sure to be a welcome innovation for the sports betting market in its many forms.