Sports Event Analyst

Gaming Intelligence Awards 2026 | North America - Supplier of the Year. 30th September 2026 6:30 pm Gaming Intelligence unveils the Supplier of the Year winners in this year's North America edition of the Gaming Intelligence Awards. While North American operators routinely dominate the headlines with their fierce market-share battles and omnipresent ad campaigns, the true engine of the region's betting and gaming boom lies beneath the surface. Today, we turn our attention to the architects of the digital floor and the sports betting betslip: the B2B suppliers. This year's battles for Supplier of the Year highlight the undisputed heavyweights of B2B gaming - the studios, data providers and platform architectures that fundamentally shape the North American player experience. Here, we reveal the winners of our North America iGaming Supplier of the Year as Evolution, Play'n GO, and Playtech go head-to-head. The iGaming Innovation of the Year category sees Evolution fight it out with IGT PlayDigital and MGM Live, while the iGaming Player Engagement Solution of the Year is a battle between Evolution, Games Global and IGT PlayDigital. The Sports Betting Supplier of the Year is between Kambi, OpenBet and Sportradar, while the Sportsbook Player Engagement Solution & Innovation of the Year sees BETER go up against Genius Sports and Sportradar. Congratulations to all our Gaming Intelligence Awards 2026 | North America winners! The winners of the GIA North America Rising Star of the Year awards were announced Tuesday, while the GIA North America Operators of the Year were announced on Monday. Tomorrow we will announce our GIA North America Game of the Year across five product categories. Evolution takes the top honours in this hotly contested category after yet another outstanding year of expansion and live dealer innovation. In a year which has seen the supplier celebrate two decades in the industry, Evolution has firmly established the gold standard for live casino across North America. Its portfolio has grown from a handful of live tables to more than 2,000 live tables globally, a number that has doubled over the past five years alone, which is backed up by strong regional distribution. Evolution's North America revenue grew by nearly 10 per cent to €159.7 million in the first half of 2026, and with a seventh live casino studio recently opening in the US, the company has come a long way from its beginnings in 2006 from a single studio in Latvia. The exclusive Hasbro partnership added new global IP for live casino and slot, highlighted by the success of MONOPOLY Live's launch in New Jersey, Delaware, Connecticut, and Michigan. Evolution hasn't just supplied the North American market, it has actively shaped its trajectory and is a deserved winner this year. The first 20 years is just the beginning. As North American operators face escalating customer acquisition costs, maximizing player lifetime value has become a critical commercial imperative. IGT PlayDigital's Engagement Platform isn't just a retention tool, but redefines player engagement by giving operators a powerful solution to attract, reward and retain players across their entire gaming journey. In a market where retention is the ultimate battleground, operators can deploy a suite of promotional tools, including jackpots, prize drops, leaderboards, missions, tournaments, and network promotions, across both proprietary and third-party content. The launch of MEGA VAULT, combining multiple engagement mechanics into a turnkey promotional experience, helped drive the platform's exceptional performance across IGT PlayDigital's operator network in the past year, as Engagement Platform promotions delivered a 193.1x increase in handle, an 11.94x increase in active players, and a 1.23x increase in average spins per user across 228 promotions. An engagement ecosystem that helps operators build deeper player relationships while delivering measurable commercial outcomes, it is a worthy winner of our iGaming Player Engagement Solution of the Year. Evolution takes the 2026 iGaming Innovation award for Dream Creator, a platform that allows operators to build their own custom slots using established game math models such as Megaways, 777 Strike, Cash Volt, and Cash Goddess. Operators simply choose the model that fits their concept and then customize the game with their own logos, backgrounds, symbols, animations, reel layout, and soundtrack. Since September 2025, Dream Creator has delivered strong results across all metrics, including active players, wagers and gross gaming revenue. By offering a fast and efficient way to produce custom games featuring some of the best math models in the industry, Evolution is delivering greater engagement for operators and a steady supply of entertaining new games for players, a win-win combination that fully justifies this award. OpenBet maintains its position as North America's leading sports betting technology provider, powering more operators than any competing third-party platform. Over the past year, it supported 22 WLA member lotteries and provided its technology to more than 200 customers, helping to deliver the sports betting ambitions of the region's leading operators. Operationally, the OpenBet sportsbook platform continued to deliver record performance with 100% uptime during marquee US events such as the Super Bowl and March Madness, and processed $3 billion in stakes and 175 million bets during the 2026 FIFA World Cup. OpenBet's acquisition of SportCast brought modern same game parlays to sports fans, while the OpenLocator and Neccton geolocation and responsible gambling solutions help to ensure regulatory compliance in fragmented North American markets. It is no surprise that OpenBet is the partner of choice for commercial, state and tribal gaming operators alike. Sportradar's game-changing AI platform 4Sight transforms live sports viewing into an immersive, high-value betting experience for the player. 4Sight combines real-time data, predictive analytics, and slick visual storytelling to deliver actionable context precisely when fan excitement peaks. Supercharging coverage for major operators including DraftKings, as well as streaming service Peacock's tailored NBA Performance View, 4Sight translates complex match metrics into clear insights on momentum, player performance, and scoring probability across sports content. The business impact is undeniable: during ATP broadcasts, 4Sight drove a 22 per cent surge in betting activity while extending total watch time by 35 per cent. Sportradar's 4Sight is winner of our Sportsbook Player Engagement Solution & Innovation award for bringing together official data, cutting-edge AI, and real-time betting context within live video streams to make in-play wagering more accessible and compelling.

Press releases. Genius Sports and Equativ bring live Sports Moment targeting to StackAdapt. 11 September 2026 Genius Sports Limited ("Genius Sports") (NYSE: GENI), a global leader in real-time sports data and technology, today announced a new partnership with Equativ and StackAdapt that enables advertisers and agencies to programmatically reach sports fans with creative that responds to what's happening on the field, in real time. Sports advertising has always been constrained by fixed scheduling: the same spot runs regardless of whether the game is scoreless or if a fan is on the edge of their seat. Genius Sports' Moment Engine changes that by reading and reacting to live game data feeds in real time, giving advertisers critical contextual insight into what's happening during a game. Now integrated into StackAdapt's AI advertising platform alongside Equativ's creative enhancement technology, brands can activate campaigns during a game's peak emotional moments and use dynamic creative optimization to align ad messaging with the mood fans are experiencing. For programmatic buyers, the partnership brings the Moment Engine's moment-based advertising capabilities directly into the StackAdapt media-buying workflow. The new solution combines Genius Sports' live game signals and audiences with Equativ's creative enhancement technology and StackAdapt's performance buying platform, giving brands two ways to activate. * Genius Deal Library: Select ready-to-run Genius Sports Moments audience deals in StackAdapt's marketplace with programmatic Deal IDs, with no new trafficking or creative rebuild required. Genius Sports data and Equativ's Sports Ticker enhancement can add live scores and upcoming matchups to a brand's existing CTV, video, or display creative. * Custom High-Impact: Equativ's high-impact creative technology pairs with Genius Moments to dynamically adapt campaign messaging in real time to the action on the field, from interceptions to game-winning drives, allowing creative to reflect the same live context the fan is experiencing. Both offerings are now available directly through StackAdapt via curated Deal IDs from Genius Sports and Equativ. While audience data helps determine who to reach, live game data helps determine when to reach them, allowing StackAdapt buyers to align media and creative with the moments when fan attention and emotion are highest. "Programmatic advertising has become incredibly sophisticated at understanding who a consumer is, but live sports give marketers another powerful signal: when that consumer is most engaged," said Josh Linforth, Chief Revenue Officer at Genius Sports. "Together with Equativ and StackAdapt, we're making that intelligence easy to activate within the existing media-buying workflow, giving brands a way to respond to the game as it happens rather than simply advertise around it." Built for the Second Screen The offering is designed to complement, rather than interrupt, the live sports experience by reaching fans across the digital environments they use while watching. With 84% of sports fans using a companion screen such as mobile during a broadcast, brands have a significant opportunity to extend live sports campaigns beyond the television screen. According to Equativ's research, sports fans are also 91% more likely to pay attention to an ad featuring a relevant live score, demonstrating the value of connecting advertising to a game's context. "Live sports is the most powerful emotional environment in media," said Frank Maguire, SVP, Product Marketing & Sustainability at Equativ. "As a fan's mood shifts from tension to elation in a matter of seconds according to gameplay, an ad that ignores that shift is easy to tune out. This partnership gives advertisers a simple way to understand and activate against these moments, with dynamic creative optimization that lets brands move with the emotion of the game and deliver personalized messages contextually relevant to what they're feeling in that precise moment. That alignment is what makes an ad resonate rather than just appear, and what makes this partnership with Genius Sports and StackAdapt transcendent for the industry." An Always-On Sports Strategy The offering extends beyond major tentpole events, allowing advertisers to build real-time sports strategies across the calendar. Genius Sports works with more than 400 leagues and federations globally, providing data across football, basketball, baseball, hockey, soccer, golf and other sports. Through StackAdapt, buyers can use that breadth to activate against sports audiences throughout entire seasons rather than limiting moment-based campaigns to events such as championships and playoffs. "Live sports creates moments of extraordinary attention, but historically it hasn't been easy for programmatic buyers to respond to those moments as they happen," said Greg Joseph, VP, Inventory Development at StackAdapt. "By bringing Genius Sports' live intelligence and Equativ's creative technology directly into StackAdapt, we're giving advertisers a simple way to make sports campaigns more responsive to the action, while keeping activation within the platform and workflow they already use." Advertisers can contact their StackAdapt, Equativ or Genius Sports representative for additional information. About Genius Sports Genius Sports is a global leader in real-time sports data, and the official technology and media partner powering the global sports ecosystem. Its platform is used in more than 150 countries, connecting leagues, teams, sportsbooks, broadcasters, brands and fans through official data, video, analytics and fan engagement solutions. Genius Sports partners with more than 1,000 sports organizations worldwide, including the NFL, English Premier League, NCAA, DraftKings, FanDuel, bet365, CBS, NBC and ESPN. Through AI, computer vision and live sports technology, Genius Sports helps rights holders capture, manage and commercialize their content across the full fan journey. For more information, visit geniussports.com. About StackAdapt StackAdapt is the leading AI advertising and orchestration platform marketers rely on to drive brand growth and revenue. Built entirely in-house with an easy-to-use interface, StackAdapt unifies programmatic and owned channels - including CTV, DOOH, display, native, audio, email, and more - into one seamless experience. The platform makes it easy to find the right audience, personalize creative, run campaigns, optimize, and measure results in one place. Trusted by the most forward-thinking brands and agencies, StackAdapt combines speed of innovation, deep vertical expertise, and partnership that powers real business growth. For further information, visit www.stackadapt.com. About Equativ Equativ is a global, end-to-end media platform empowering advertisers and publishers to achieve real outcomes by uniting premium inventory, dynamic creative formats, and engaged audiences with advanced curation and AI-powered ad tech across all channels. Purpose-built for the attention economy, Equativ delivers quality, engagement, and performance while prioritizing respectful, user-centric ad experiences. With a team of over 750 professionals across 19 countries, Equativ combines global scale with deep local expertise. Learn more at Equativ.com. Contacts Genius Sports [email protected] Brandon Bukstel, Investor Relations Manager +1 (954)-554-7932 [email protected]