Serbian consortium wins Kyrgyzstan lottery licence

Elbet and Axel Capital have 20 days to iron out an agreement with the State Lottery Company.
Elbet and Axel Capital have 20 days to iron out an agreement with the State Lottery Company.

Elbet d.o.o and Axel Capital’s bid for the Kyrgyzstan lottery licence has been approved.

Kyrgyzstan’s Centre for Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) has announced that the Serbian consortium of Elbet d.o.o and Axel Capital has won the contract to operate under the country’s State Lottery Company.   

The State Lottery Company was ordered to launch a tender in October to find a private partner to revive its lottery offering.

Kyrgyzstan launched a state lottery in 2018, but the PPP sought a “comprehensive large-scale revival and development of lottery activities” under new operators.

The State Lottery Company selected Elbet and Axel Capital’s bid to forward to the PPP for review. The bid has now been deemed to have “fulfilled the qualification requirements to be on the ballot paper for the final choice of operators”.

The tender commission has only determined the winner. The State Lottery Company now has to conclude an agreement to form a public-private company with the consortium within 20 days, after which the consortium of companies will be registered in Kyrgyzstan.

Belgrade-based Elbet will serve as the lead technology partner for the contract. The gambling software and hardware solutions provider was founded in 2002 and offers product lines of sports betting, bingo and gaming and lottery terminals. It says it currently services 80 client operators worldwide, including four state lotteries.

Founded in 2002 by Anna Nikolayevsky, Axel Capital Management is an equity hedge fund manager primarily operating in Eastern Europe. It says it invests in “innovative, high-growth-potential companies”.

Of course, when it comes to lottery tenders all eyes are on the UK, where the winner of the next National Lottery licence is finally due to be announced next month.

The bidders hoping to take the licence from Camelot are the rebranded Allwyn, Sisal and Northern and Shell.

The UK government is also due to publish its delayed gambling white paper following its review of existing gambling legislation.

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