New partners. New markets. New games. These are the three pillars which arguably could define Swintt’s year so far, and according to Head of Marketing Tereza Melicharkova, this is just the beginning.
In a sit down chat at SBC Summit Barcelona, Melicharkova took the time to speak with SBC Media to reflect on a busy year for Swintt before letting us in on some grand plans for 2024.
A firm favourite
Throughout the event, the Swintt stand was abuzz with delegates taking part in a penalty-style football game in a bid to win a range of prizes. But this football-themed game wasn’t just a way to get people to visit the stand.
Instead, it was a sneak peek into what we can expect from Swintt in the coming months; for those eagle-eyed delegates among us, you may have spotted a familiar face.
Melicharkova began: “We are in the process of launching two new games, which we are working very hard on as we speak. At SBC Summit Barcelona, we have been promoting one of these new games called Vinnie Jones Crazy Footy which has been developed in collaboration with, as the name of the game tells you, Swintt’s favourite ambassador Vinnie Jones. The slot will spotlight his life as a football player.
“The symbols will feature images of him in his football days, and as you may know, he was known for his time in the Crazy Gang. We are hoping that this will resonate with UK players when we bring this to the market.”
This isn’t the only game being developed in collaboration with Vinnie Jones. To complete the trilogy, Swintt is in the process of revamping its 2022 hit title The Crown ahead of a UK debut.
Following a similar storyline to the original, The Crown: Reloaded will see Vinnie Jones take his gang around the streets of London – but this time, there have been a few tweaks made along the way.
She continued: “We launched the first edition of the Vinnie Jones’ games back in 2022, however we were not actually operating in the UK market at that time. So we decided to revamp the title, and bring it to UK players.
“It will very much focus on a similar theme as the original, featuring Vinnie Jones and his gang. But the graphics will be much more exciting, there will be new features plus the inclusion of features which proved to be extremely popular in our Aloha Spirit XtraLock title.
“People in the UK know Vinnie Jones from his time as a footballer and actor. He is a really key part of building our brand awareness among players in this market.
“It is also worth highlighting that Vinnie Jones is a philanthropist, which is super important for us; we want to try to give back to communities, something that he has been doing for a long time with various charities in the UK. So I believe we found the perfect match by working together.”
New territories
As Melicharkova explained to SBC Media, the inclusion of Vinnie Jones in Swintt’s titles will enable the games developer to reach new audiences across the UK market.
But she is confident that these games will also enable Swintt to expand its reach across the Ontario market once the firm makes its debut in Canada: “We are looking into newly regulated markets; this is our primary focus. We have been working very hard on establishing which markets we should enter over the next few years.
“One market which will be a big focus for us is the UK. And recently, we attended the Canadian Gaming Summit in Toronto as we are looking at launching in the Ontario market very soon. We are very, very excited about that. I believe that our games with Vinnie Jones will work really well here as it’s a similar market to the UK.”
Canada isn’t the only market that Swintt will be focusing on. In a similar fashion to its product roadmap, Melicharkova noted that there are also big plans to expand Swintt’s global footprint in 2024.
“As part of Glitnor Group, we are also very focused on the US market. And then there is Bulgaria and Greece too, we’ve certainly identified some new opportunities here,” she added.
“I think that everyone in the industry can agree that it takes longer to enter a market than anyone has previously anticipated. There are so many things to get right first, so that’s what we’re focusing on. But stay tuned for further announcements about market entries.”
Upgrades and new partnerships
In previous interviews with SBC, Melicharkova has shared plans for SwinttStudios – a partnership program that enables studios to distribute their content via the SwinttPlatform.
After a series of upgrades carried out over the course of the last few months, the Head of Marketing shared that the development and growth of SwinttStudios will continue to be one of the major focus for the company in 2024.
She said: “We launched SwinttStudio’s partnership program early last year. The support from our partners for this particular partnership program is huge! We are also growing on the aggregation side of things too, so we are really excited about that.
“We are in the process of upgrading our platform, which as you can imagine, has been a huge undertaking. The integration is almost finalised now, so we’re looking forward to seeing that completed. I fully believe that this will be our next big milestone at Swintt.”
The upgrades to the platform, Melicharkova continued, will enable SwinttStudios to expand the reach of content to new audiences. To achieve this, the firm has created a team dedicated to the platform who are largely responsible for identifying new partners and providing top-tier support for studios.
“Since carrying out our platform upgrades, we have signed the record amount of customers that are waiting to be integrated. We have a newly-formed team who is looking into new collaborations with studios and new companies that are popping up,
“This team has been looking at how we can collaborate from an RGS perspective, we are also looking into how Swintt can provide full support from a technical, commercial and marketing point of view too.
“We are learning a lot as to how to effectively do this, and we will be bringing new partners on board in the foreseeable future – creating more content for our customers and a more diverse experience overall.”
