GAMOMAT, one of the leading independent German software developers for slot games, has won Game Studio of the Year at the International Gaming Awards 2025. The glamorous event was hosted on Sunday 19th January at Barcelona’s Intercontinental Hotel.

The Game Studio of the Year award recognises exceptional innovation, creativity, and commitment to delivering a diverse portfolio of standout games. A core element that the judges looked for was the demonstration of using the latest technologies, tools and trends to produce titles that connect with customers around the world. Book of Elements, Vegas Joker, and Crystal Ball Multi Symbols were some of GAMOMAT’s highly acclaimed releases across 2024, generating excellent feedback for their impact.

GAMOMAT Distribution GmbH Managing Director Robert Kocher said: “Walking away with Game Studio of the Year is a magical moment for the team. We care deeply about our craft and are thankful for all who contribute to producing titles that bring joy and commercial success in equal measure. This recognition gives us even more impetus to double down and make this year an even better one for the company.”

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The International Gaming Awards have earned a reputation for acknowledging the very best companies across the gaming industry.

TrueLayer, Europe’s leading open banking payments network, today revealed performance data for the first time on its new Signup+ product.

Signup+, which is live with keystone gaming clients such as WhiteHat gaming and Stakemate, is designed to drastically reduce onboarding time and drop-off rates, by helping users to register, deposit and play, in under 60 seconds.

By eliminating the tedious friction of manual onboarding, Signup+ offers users an enhanced customer experience and a reduced time-to-play journey – while offering gaming merchants increased conversion and peace of mind due to the best-in-class age and identity verification.

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Today’s performance data comes from keystone merchants, Stakemate, WhiteHat Gaming and Plucky, who confirmed that Signup+ is:

• Faster: New users registering with signup+ were able to register, deposit and play in under 60 seconds.
• Driving more volume: Signup+ has halved the drop-off rate in onboarding flows, more than doubling the number of first-time depositing customers.
• Increasing transaction value: Due to decreased friction and increased trust, these merchants have seen an increased average transaction value of up to 30%.
• Safer: Signup+ identify verification eliminates the possibility of underage gambling while greatly reducing rates of bonus abuse and card fraud.

The data comes at a key time for TrueLayer, on the opening day of ICE 2025 in Barcelona, where major gaming clients will be exploring new payment and ID verification solutions. The TrueLayer team will be offering demos at Booth 4A44 of how to get users “playing in 60 seconds”, as well as previewing its much anticipated Transaction Verified Payouts product, which has been developed alongside leading iGaming operators for the UK market and is set to launch in early 2025.

Arya Tayebi, the founder and CEO of StakeMate, said: “At StakeMate we are constantly looking for ways to reduce user friction while also maintaining a high degree of regulatory compliance. Signup+ has enabled our users to have arguably the fastest signup and deposit experience in one go.”

Roberto Villani, iGaming lead at TrueLayer, said “We’re thrilled to see these results from our igaming merchants using Signup+. Reducing customers time-to-play to under 60 seconds, while simultaneously eliminating underage play, and increasing transaction value and customer volume, is a massive win-win for merchants and gamers alike.”

Allwyn, operator of The National Lottery, announced that National Lottery players who play in shops will be able to opt to have their prizes paid directly into their bank accounts for the first time.

In a partnership with payments provider, Bottomline, Allwyn has created a quick, easy online claim process that will see retail prizes of between £500.01 and £50,000 paid more quickly than ever before.

The new solution is the latest development in the revised claims process that Allwyn had to introduce when it took over as National Lottery operator in 2024. This was following the Post Office’s decision to no longer pay National Lottery retail prizes between £500.01 and £50,000 (called ‘mid-tier prizes’).

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Last year, Allwyn continued to make upgrades to the process and has now directly paid out over 45,000 mid-tier prizes to in-store players – amounting to over £50 million in prize money.

This new enhancement isn’t just good news for players, but it will also significantly reduce administration and postage costs – as Allwyn will no longer need to prepare and post thousands of cheques. This cost efficiency will see more money going to National Lottery-funded Good Causes.

With the new payment solution, retail players can go to claims.national-lottery.co.uk, enter their email address and then fill in an easy-to-complete claim form – this asks for the player’s details, some details about the winning ticket, and prompts the player to upload an image of the ticket. If a winner has any questions during the process or needs some additional support, they can call Allwyn’s Customer Care Team who will be happy to help.

At this point, the default option will be for the prize to be paid directly into the player’s bank account, although they can still choose to be paid by cheque if that is their preference – which has been standard payment method for these up until now (including when the Post Office was still paying these prizes).

Once the claim form has been submitted and processed, the player will receive an email with a unique, secure link for them to submit their bank account number and sort code. The system will then automatically check that the name on the account matches the name entered on the prize claim form. As soon as this information has been successfully submitted by the player, the payment will be processed and will be paid directly into the player’s bank account within 24 hours*.

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Allwyn’s Operations Director, Jenny Blogg, said: “We’re delighted to introduce this completely new payment solution, which will see, for the first time, people who play The National Lottery in shops be able to have their prizes paid directly into their bank accounts.

“Not only will this see these prizes paid faster than ever before, but it also drastically cuts down on administration and postage costs. This cost efficiency will see more money going to the Good Causes that The National Lottery supports and see prize money in players’ pockets in record time – so it really is a win-win.”