Maryland panel awards 10 mobile sports wagering licenses
BALTIMORE -- The odds are looking like Marylanders will be able to place a mobile bet on sports by Thanksgiving.
The state's Sports Wagering Application Review Commission, also known as SWARC, held a license award meeting Wednesday morning in which they awarded licenses to 10 businesses two years after voters passed mobile sports betting in a referendum.
Those entities are:
- Arundel Amusements (Bingo World)
- BetMGM Maryland Sports LLC
- Crown MD Online Gaming LLC (DraftKings)
- CZR Maryland Mobile Opportunity LLC (Horseshoe Casino Baltimore)
- Greenmount OTB LLC
- Long Shot's LLC
- Maryland Stadium Sub LLC (Washington Commanders)
- PENN Maryland OSB LLC (Hollywood Casino Perryville)
- PPE Maryland Mobile LLC (Live! Casino and Hotel)
- Riverboat on the Potomac LLC
"it feels like a dream still, but we are right on the cusp now of launching that first bet so we're excited," said Antonio Jones, with Riverboat on the Potomac.
"It was great to get through this process, it was a long process, but it needed to be a long process," said Randy Conroy, with Horseshoe Casino Baltimore.
The companies will now have to pass a final testing phase, which includes controlled demonstrations of systems and showing regulators they'll work as advertised.
Maryland Lottery and Gaming will identify an initial start date, and no launches will occur before that date.
Businesses that have been awarded licenses by SWARC and have completed all operational tasks by the initial start date will be given clearance to launch on that date.
Gov. Larry Hogan is betting the approved apps will be live and taking bets before Thanksgiving next week, a big day for NFL games.
"To reach this point, we have had to overcome countless legal, political, and bureaucratic delays that threatened to push back the launch past the Super Bowl next year," Hogan said in a statement Monday. "It was completely unacceptable to me, and we spent months pressing for decisive action. Thanks to those efforts, and after repeated interventions by our administration, we now anticipate the launch of mobile sports betting this month, and we are cautiously optimistic that it will be in time for Thanksgiving."
Maryland Lottery and Gaming officials predict mobile wagers could generate roughly $30 million in tax revenue in its first year and $100 million by year five.
"Maryland took every single precaution they could have taken to be safe as possible and as open to online sports betting businesses and operators as they potentially could, to the detriment of getting something up and running in a timely fashion," said sports betting expert Robert Linnehan.
This is a developing story and will be updated.