How KamaGames is shaping the Online Poker gaming Industry using Blockchain

KamaGames is the largest social mobile poker operator. Having started out in 2010 they have come a long way and now today KamaGames has 250+ staff spread across offices in London and Dubai, with its headquarters situated in Dublin. The company’s first product launch, Pokerist, has been the No. 1 grossing app in 101 countries on iOS and was among the top five grossing across 45 countries on Google Play. Sounds interesting right? Well, KamaGames is on the buzz again and this time they are planning to hit big with Blockchain technology.

KamaGames has two main rivals in the industry Zynga, which is the absolute market leader in the genre and WSOP/Playtika which has very similar social mobile poker numbers to KamaGames. It won the hearts of its user by introducing a unique feature of Multi-Table Tournaments – KamaGames is the first social casino operator to launch MTT. KamaGames is the only company out of the three mentioned above, to offer b2b partnerships.

When asked for comments on their token release, Andrey Kuznetsov, CEO of KamaGames said that the intention behind the token release is to make it easier for the company’s 100 million+ players to purchase in-game currency for the social casino games. Further, Kuznetsov added “This is a way for our players to buy in-game currency at a more lucrative rate” and clarifying that “This is not an ICO in anyway. This is a token sale. KamaGames Tokens (KGT) are not an Initial Coin Offering in the conventional sense. We are providing a Token Sale, which uses crypto technology, but should not be confused with an ICO. The Token Sale was not established to generate funds from investors. Our mission is to provide a new way for our players to gain in-game currency and to also allow us to attract new users, engage our current audience and to once again, differentiate us from the rest of the market”.

The company prefers Ethereum over Bitcoin as ETH is in most cases a utility token and therefore should be considered as a commodity, however, BTC is the closest to an actual currency. The Bitcoin is still not fully recognised as currency at this time as there are certain criteria that are not being met by BTC. It’s not widely accepted yet, is very volatile and, in reality,

Throwing some lights on the views he has for the new technology, CEO believes blockchain technology clearly has a lot to offer. There are lots of areas in the modern-day transaction system where establishing “trust” and verification costs operators both money and time and the application of DLT technology aims to remedy it. It may or may not change the landscape of digital payments in the future, but it will definitely bring new levels of efficiency to operators. We believe that one or a few cryptocurrencies will exist in the future and compete with fiat serving as a transaction medium, other than being a speculative instrument. Although, we don’t see any of them serving the main functions of a currency now.

The company wants this technology in the gaming industry just so that its users may have a different level of experience when they wish to make a transaction with the in-game currency. What could be the better option than to provide its users with the most influential and prominent technology? The KamaGame tokens are basically utility tokens that can be exchanged for in-game virtual currency only. In order to make these transactions, players will just need a KamaGames player account. The account enables players to redeem free chips that are awarded on a daily basis as well as any future discounts, bonuses, or services that could be made available to token holders in the future.

Over time, players will be able to exchange KamaGames Tokens for a higher and higher number of chips. The most patient of players will be rewarded with a maximum 11-fold growth for leaving their tokens untouched.

The company guarantees that these numbers are solid and can be exchanged for conventional fiat currency or via a wide variety of cryptocurrencies. What’s more fascinating is that KamaGames promise a monthly increase rate of 25%, linear for three years.

To break down the figures:

initial purchase: 1 token will amount to 7,000,000 chips
6 months later: 1 token will amount to 17,500,000 chips
12 months later: 1 token will amount to 35,000,000 chips
24 months later: 1 token will amount to 56,000,000 chips
36 months later: 1 token will amount to 77,000,000 chips

In 2017, KamaGames saw its gross revenues shoot up by a whopping 63.4% to a gigantic figure of $57.5 million, which was massive compared to its value in the previous year(2016) at $35.2 million. In the first quarter of 2018, KamaGames’ revenue increased by 47.9% compared to its revenues in the first quarter of 2017.

With hosting 530,000 daily active users and is still self-funded Chief legal officer at KamaGames, Roman Abramenko clarified in an interview that the company complies with U.S. regulators, and therefore KamaGames will not add their tokens on to any exchange or facilitate the reselling of their cryptocurrency.

KamaGames Tokens can only be converted into in-game virtual currency, chips. CEO, Kuznetsov added that the revenue generated from the token sale will be shelved and will only be recognised when the tokens are exchanged for in-game chips.

KamaGames is speculating that the usage of cryptocurrency would definitely bring more players to their games

“In the worst case for us, if all players were token buyers, and they hold their tokens for 36 months and they redeem all bonuses, then they will get 11 times more chips than they would have gotten at day one,” Kuznetsov said. “That sounds like a huge inflation, but we believe that based on how players play, that they will exchange tokens for chips regularly. We will be fine, and the economy of the game will be stable. We are going to launch five new games, including new slots games which will help us maintain the game’s economy and retain a healthy and strong balance.”