Since he was very young, Jorge Morales learned about the business world. Raised in a family of entrepreneur-merchants, marketing topics soon piqued his curiosity. That desire for knowledge was firstly focused on sales. An electronic engineer from the University of Puerto Rico, in this exclusive interview, Morales tells that, in his youth, he was very shy, but delving into issues that involved developing solid bonds with other people helped him overcome that obstacle and allowed him to establish strong relationships with clients, many of whom became his friends.
In 2005, he started in the gaming industry and was fascinated with its dynamics and opportunities, He went through important companies such as Bally, BetStone, Microgaming and Playtech until, in November 2020, he joined Continent 8 Technologies, where he currently holds the position of Sales Director for the Americas. His entry occurred just as the company was penetrating into the LatAm market with the launch of its cloud solution in Colombia. Since then, in addition to that network point in Bogota, the firm has successfully expanded into the region, with another hub in Mexico and advancements in Argentina and Brazil.
As Jorge explains, this important move is a consequence of Continent 8 Technologies being a provider of managed hosting, connectivity, and cyber security solutions that is bringing 20 years of iGaming experience to the LatAm market. With a world-wide carrier-grade network spanning over 70 connected locations and four continents, Continent 8 can support local businesses to grow globally.
In that sense, in addition to Jorge, Continent 8 has a powerful team in the Latin American region, led by the very experienced and accomplished Gabriel Szlaifsztein, General Manager and Business Consultant for Latin America, and Nick Nally, Managing Director for the Americas. About this, Morales underlines: “Continent 8 heavily invests in recruiting and maintaining a highly skilled staff. I think the main strength of the company is its people.”
Of course, Jorge is following closely the sports betting and iGaming regulatory situation in LatAm. To better illustrate the company’s strong commitment to the sector, this executive recalls that, in Atlantic City, United States, Continent 8 Technologies decided to request for a casino license in order to go through the entire regulatory process to build a data center in that city; to be able to provide technology services to all operators that entered that market. Undoubtedly, it is a great example of how far Continent 8 can go to deliver a cutting-edge service, transmit that knowledge and work together with regulators to respond to their needs, offering a service of the highest quality.
In order for our readers to take a first look at this 18-minute video interview, we bring you here some excerpts:
ABOUT HIS INVOLVEMENT INTO THE GAMING INDUSTRY
“I had just come from working for Hewlett-Packard in the manufacturing industry. Honestly, the only knowledge I had of casinos was when I used to take my grandmother to gamble. I had the opportunity to start during a very interesting time for the gaming industry, when slot machines were transitioning to the ‘TITO system’ (Ticket-in, ticket out). I had also the chance to work in systems and in servers that were connected to the machines. That helped me a lot, because, if we see it now, a few years into the future, we have a similar transition in the industry. It is not that land-based casinos are changing, but there is an expansion in the area of online gambling.”
ABOUT CONTINENT 8 EXPANDING INTO LATAM
“Why do we see an increasing presence of Continent 8 in Latin America? Because regulations have allowed us to strongly enter into the region. With this, we offer an interconnection point for this entire network of more than 70 data centers globally. Apart from our hubs in Bogota and Mexico, we are bringing access lines to deliver latency to Brazil directly from Europe. It is a project that is in process; as well as the interconnection of Latin America with the United States. Regarding our team, we have a group spread throughout the world.”
ABOUT IT SECURITY
“Continent 8 has a business line completely focused on security and risk management aspects, offering 24/7 monitoring. The company also has a global private network, which helps clients’ data or the operation itself to not pass to the public network. It is kept internally. This gives greater security not only to the operators, but also to the user, who is sharing a lot of private information with that operator.”
The full interview is available in Spanish, with English subtitles (please, turn on the Closed Captions option in your YouTube settings) on G&M News’ YouTube channel, where you can subscribe to enjoy much more content about the gaming industry.