Aleš Gornjec, Comtrade Gaming: “Compliance has become a continuous operational discipline”
Focus Gaming News spoke with Comtrade Gaming CEO Aleš Gornjec about navigating international compliance challenges and managing regulatory fragmentation across multiple jurisdictions.
Exclusive interview.- As regulated gaming markets continue to expand around the world, compliance has evolved from a one-time certification requirement into one of the industry’s most complex and strategic challenges. Operators entering new jurisdictions must navigate an increasingly fragmented regulatory landscape, where requirements for responsible gaming, KYC, reporting, taxation, cybersecurity, and data governance can vary significantly from one market to another. In this environment, technology providers play a critical role in helping operators balance regulatory obligations with scalability, efficiency, and speed to market.
In this exclusive interview with Focus Gaming News, Aleš Gornjec, CEO of Comtrade Gaming, shares his perspective on how compliance has transformed over the past decade and why platform architecture has become a decisive factor for international growth. He discusses the challenges of supporting multiple regulated markets simultaneously, lessons learned from emerging jurisdictions such as Brazil, and the investments Comtrade Gaming is making to help operators stay ahead of increasingly complex regulatory demands.
Comtrade Gaming has supported operators across a wide range of regulated markets. From your perspective, how has the challenge of compliance changed over the past decade?
Ten years ago, compliance was largely about obtaining certifications and demonstrating that a platform met a regulator’s requirements at launch. Today, compliance has become a continuous operational discipline. Regulators are more sophisticated, reporting obligations are more demanding, and requirements evolve much faster than in the past.
We are also seeing significant divergence between markets. While certain core principles remain consistent, every jurisdiction now has its own approach to areas such as responsible gaming, KYC, taxation, reporting, player protection, geolocation, and data handling. As a result, platform providers must be able to adapt rapidly while maintaining a stable core platform.
The challenge is no longer simply reaching compliance—it’s staying compliant as regulations, technologies, and player expectations continue to evolve.
“The challenge is no longer simply reaching compliance—it’s staying compliant as regulations, technologies, and player expectations continue to evolve.”
Aleš Gornjec, CEO at Comtrade Gaming.
As operators continue expanding internationally, what are some of the biggest compliance challenges Comtrade Gaming helps them navigate?
One of the biggest challenges is managing complexity at scale. Every new market introduces additional integrations, reporting requirements, operational processes, and regulatory controls.
For example, operators may need country-specific KYC providers, geolocation services, tax calculations, responsible gaming controls, or regulator reporting feeds. At the same time, they want a unified operational view of their business rather than running separate platforms for every market.
Our role is to absorb that complexity. We provide a framework that allows operators to enter new jurisdictions while maintaining a consistent player experience, operational model, and reporting structure across their organisation.
Time-to-market is also critical. Regulatory opportunities often have narrow launch windows, and operators need technology partners capable of adapting quickly without introducing unnecessary risk.
How does Comtrade Gaming approach the balance between maintaining a scalable platform and adapting to the unique requirements of each jurisdiction?
This balance starts with architecture.
Our philosophy is to maintain a strong, stable core platform while isolating regulatory differences through dedicated adapters, configuration layers, and jurisdiction-specific modules. Rather than creating separate platform versions for each market, we build compliance capabilities in a modular way.
This approach allows us to support multiple jurisdictions simultaneously while avoiding fragmentation of the product. It also ensures that innovation developed for one market can be leveraged across others whenever appropriate.
The result is a platform that can scale internationally without becoming increasingly difficult to maintain.
What are some of the most common misconceptions operators have about compliance when planning entry into new regulated markets?
A common misconception is that compliance is primarily a certification exercise.
In reality, certification is often the easiest part. The greater challenge is adapting operational processes, customer journeys, reporting obligations, integrations, and support models to local requirements.
Another misconception is assuming that regulations are similar because markets are geographically close. We’ve seen neighbouring jurisdictions adopt significantly different requirements around player registration, reporting, responsible gaming, or technical architecture.
Successful operators treat compliance as a strategic business capability rather than a one-time project.
“Successful operators treat compliance as a strategic business capability rather than a one-time project.”
Aleš Gornjec, CEO at Comtrade Gaming.
How important is platform architecture when it comes to supporting multiple jurisdictions simultaneously, and how has Comtrade Gaming evolved its technology to meet those demands?
Platform architecture is absolutely fundamental.
Without the right architecture, every new market increases complexity exponentially. Eventually, innovation slows, operating costs rise, and compliance risks increase.
Over the years, we’ve invested heavily in creating a modular, API-first architecture that supports multi-jurisdiction deployment models. Our platform includes regulatory adapters, configurable reporting frameworks, jurisdiction-specific integrations, and strong data governance capabilities.
We’ve also developed reporting and compliance frameworks designed specifically for regulated environments, allowing new regulatory requirements to be implemented without major platform redesign. This flexibility is essential for operators pursuing international growth.
Can you share an example of a regulatory challenge that required significant adaptation from a platform provider, and what lessons were learned from that experience?
Brazil is a good example of the challenges that come with a newly regulated market. When regulations are introduced for the first time, operators, platform providers, test laboratories, and regulators may interpret certain requirements differently. As the market matures, these interpretations become aligned through practical implementation and ongoing dialogue.
This often results in continuous adjustments, optimisations, and compliance updates during the initial phase of market opening. The key lesson is that compliance is not a one-time certification exercise but an ongoing process that requires flexibility, rapid response capabilities, and close collaboration across the industry.
As regulations continue to evolve globally, what technologies, processes, or investments is Comtrade Gaming prioritising to stay ahead of compliance requirements?
We are investing in three key areas.
First, platform adaptability. Our focus is on expanding configurability and modularity so that new regulatory requirements can be implemented faster and with less operational impact.
Second, configuration. Compliance increasingly depends on the ability to adapt to new rules quickly. We are building a highly configurable system so that we can introduce a change coming from one jurisdiction without breaking anything for the others.
Third, data governance and reporting. Regulators are demanding more transparency and auditability than ever before. We continue investing in reporting frameworks, data quality controls, and compliance tooling that enable operators to meet those expectations efficiently.
Ultimately, staying ahead of compliance means building systems that are both flexible and resilient.
Looking ahead, what do you believe will be the biggest compliance challenge facing operators?
The biggest challenge will be managing increasing regulatory fragmentation while maintaining operational efficiency.
For many years, the industry hoped that greater standardisation would emerge as more jurisdictions regulated online gaming. While organisations such as the Gaming Standards Association have invested significant effort into developing common standards—including the Remote Regulatory Interface (RRI) for regulatory monitoring—the reality is that most jurisdictions continue to develop their own unique technical, reporting, and auditing requirements.
From a platform provider’s perspective, this means we are not moving towards a world with fewer compliance variants; in many ways, we are moving towards more. Every new market tends to introduce its own reporting formats, responsible gaming requirements, monitoring interfaces, certification processes, and operational controls.
At the same time, regulators are increasing expectations around player protection, responsible gaming, cybersecurity, data privacy, and increasingly the governance of AI-driven systems. Operators and suppliers must therefore manage growing compliance obligations without sacrificing scalability and speed of innovation.
The winners will be those who invest in architectural flexibility. The ability to introduce a new regulatory adapter, reporting framework, or monitoring interface without redesigning the entire platform will become a critical competitive advantage.
Ultimately, I believe success over the next five years will not be determined by who can build a platform for a single jurisdiction. It will be determined by who can build and operate a platform capable of adapting rapidly across dozens of jurisdictions simultaneously.
