😕4D lottery: Gap
What is the problem? Market gap, & why now?
What is the problem? Market gap, & why now?
Due to the structural and over-regulation, existing lottery companies have been struggling to grow. Despite this, lottery companies fly under the radar but fit into the fabric of society as a way of life with millions of customers from all walks of life, globally, making small bets into lottery gaming on a daily basis.
Collectively, the lottery gaming industry has existed for decades and has been insanely profitable. According to the online statistics, in 2024 projections by Business Research, $350bn is the global market size with Singapore SG Sports toto 22/23 annual report at $11.4b sgd ($8.55b USD) revenue.
The current customer’s user experience journey is simple. Everyday, they will visit a lottery gaming outlet and make a bet according to their “lucky number”. It could be their date of birth, vehicle license registration number, “lucky number” and so forth. With a successful bet, user’s hold the receipt and await the moment for the lottery draw. If they win it, they will go to the company to make a winning claim. If they lose, they will buy again the next lottery draw day.
The existing lottery product varies differently from country to country. For instance, there are 4D, 6D, 6D + jackpot, 7D, 7D + jackpot etc. *4D refers to 4 digit numeric bet; ie. 1234*. The gaming process has been the same for decades. There is no innovation due to the government over-regulation preventing customers from making bets online and digitally.
Due to the lack of digital-medium and over-regulation, and lack of innovation from the existing lottery companies, there exists a “grey market”, where intermediate agents and their network fills this gap. These agents and syndicates acquire customers directly via peer to peer P2P, collecting payment of bets directly from users by providing a better service, direct access through existing relationships and competitive referral commission programs.
Similarly, existing network of users make bets by placing orders of their desired 4D/6D bets to their agents through messages. The agents will send these orders to the syndicate networks in order for them to collect their commission, but not assuming the payout risk. These bets are settled post-draw, to see if there are any wins. If the user wins, then the agents will make a payout to the users. If the user lost, then, the agent will collect the $ from the customers.
If you can see from the process above, the counter-party risk is huge, whereby everyone depends on each other's trust, if the payment and payout will be guaranteed.
Lottery betting markets are history. Public listed company that rakes in billions for shareholders and customers gets nothing from company.
As all existing lottery gaming networks are mostly operated on physical locations or through agent’s local networks, these are limitations to scale and grow. Lottery companies operate based on physical locations with support staff at every city, locally. “Grey market” operates on trust and local relationships and couldn’t scale more to the international market.
On top of that, there are zero data points that can be improved or used. Lottery companies have no idea who the customers are, while the “grey market” operates on trust with a piece of paper operating through 3rd party agent's network.
