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00:00All right, let's close it out with West Virginia, new operator of the VIP kind here.
00:04Pat, tell us more.
00:06Yeah, this was a really interesting story.
00:07I think we talk a lot about the industry and what's happening in terms of operators.
00:13Of course, Vandal and DraftKings are the major players.
00:16You've got your second tier of BetMGM, Caesars, Fanatics, ESPN, Bet, what have you,
00:23Bet365, and then kind of more niche operators.
00:30VIP Play is a new one, quote unquote,
00:33but it is actually active in Tennessee right now as 24-7 Sports,
00:37which is, of course, just an online-only market.
00:39So it's just a little online sports book.
00:42The company is coming out, rebranding.
00:44They've got a new partnership with a provider to create a new,
00:49and they promise, better app, including Online Casino,
00:53which is why they're entering into West Virginia,
00:55which, of course, is one of the few states with Online Casino.
01:01Again, we'll see what happens.
01:04I think when you're looking at the market of sports book operators,
01:10at some point, you're going to find these operators that are going for smaller markets
01:14and just making their little piece.
01:16I think that's probably what VIP Play is doing.
01:19They did say this is the beginning of a North American expansion,
01:22so I would expect a couple other states to launch,
01:25or maybe even Canada.
01:26Who knows?
01:26I guess they're in full plans.
01:30But yeah, it's kind of like, you know,
01:32last week we talked about Kentucky getting Prime Sports,
01:34a smaller sports book focused on sharp bettors that can get lots of bets down
01:41without worrying about a limit.
01:43Very similar to Circa, which is also kind of slowly rolling out
01:47and expanding their footprint.
01:48And those are the operators.
01:49I think that they're not too concerned about taking a massive amount of handle,
01:52like the FanDuels and the DraftKings,
01:54or they're just going in and getting what revenue they can
01:58and thinking, okay, we'll make what we can,
02:00and we're not too worried about being the major player.
02:04See what happens over the next couple of years
02:06in terms of that second tier of operators
02:09that some of them are struggling in markets
02:12to gain a market share that might be worthwhile to them
02:15for how much marketing spend they're doing
02:18or how much their overhead is.
02:20So yeah, VIP play.
02:22Certainly keep an eye out on them in your state
02:25if you do have a legal market,
02:27and they might be coming to you soon.