After delays with the Isle of Man government the island nation has finally seen its first licensed online casino go live.
Sun International launched its CasinoAtlantis.com site on Dec. 31, making history in the tiny island off the east coast of England.
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"This is the only online casino that boasts similar standards of regulation to those required for the operation of a traditional casino."
-Tobin Prior
Sun International
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The site, which was to be ready to launch in November, was delayed as different departments in the Isle of Man government structure were at odds over regulatory issues.
Gillian Hatton, Marketing Director for Sun Online, told IGN that the issues had been resolved, but she wasn't able to comment further.
The site has been live for less than a week, but Hatton said traffic has been high.
Sun has a number of partnerships with other Web sites, the most noticeable with MSN's U.K. portal. Those agreements, coupled with the brand recognition of the Atlantis land-based hotel and casino have brought a sizeable amount of traffic to the site in the opening days of operation, Hatton said.
"These things have helped get traffic to the site," she said. "We also had a teaser site in operation as well so the URL isn't exactly unknown. We are very pleased with the results so far."
The hotel, a haven for U.S. tourists vacationing in the Caribbean, won't be able to target its biggest sector of land-based visitors to the Internet. She said the company fully expects to convert many of its other hotel visitors to Internet play when they are away from the property.
Hatton said players from Austria, the Bahamas, China, Germany, Sweden and the United States are banned from playing at the site, as are players under the age of 18.
There are 15 games to choose from with both download and no-download options. In addition to the English-language casino, there are Spanish, French, Italian, and Portuguese versions of the site. Boss Media developed software.
Other stipulations of the licensing agreement include reviewed payouts and games that are independently tested for fairness; PriceWaterhouse Coopers and Technical Systems Testing audited the Sun site. There are also provisions to protect players, among them is a £2 million ($2.9 million) bond set aside by each licensee to guarantee payouts to the winners.
Marketing efforts within the Sun International structure will be focused on the Atlantis property initially, Hatton said. She said having a gaming facility at the hotel in Paradise Island, Bahamas will give them a leg up on other Internet casinos.
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"In this business customers historically have not stuck around too long in the pure-play online casinos."
-Gillian Hatton
Sun International
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"The fact that we operate a land-based entity [means] we have knowledge of the casino customer," she said. "The trust factor comes in to play much more quickly so that helps us acquire players and it also helps us convert the ones that are nervous and would like to play online for real money but to date maybe have only played for fun."
CEO Tobin Prior, who was out of the office this week, released a statement on the launch of the site. He said the commencement of online casino gambling in the Isle of Man is a huge step in getting online casinos up to standards that are in place for their land-based counterparts.
"This is the only online casino that boasts similar standards of regulation to those required for the operation of a traditional casino," he said. "We spent more than a year developing the technology behind the innovative processes designed to limit underage gaming, credit card fraud and play from illegal jurisdictions."
Hatton said that the focus will be on converting land-based customers to the Internet and adding incentives with Sun's frequent customers.
"It (the site) helps in the retention of customers, and customer loyalty," she said. "In this business customers historically have not stuck around too long in the pure-play online casinos."
Sun is one of three gaming companies to receive casino licenses in the Isle of Man in September, but it holds the distinction of being the first to gets its casino up and running.
Littlewoods Leisure and MGM Mirage, the other two license recipients, are expected to launch their own casinos before the end of this year. The Isle of Man government plans to issue another nine licenses in the near future.