William Hill Bets On Virtual Reality Racing

William Hill bets on virtual reality racing

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1 October 2015

Anyone who has been to a racecourse will know the excitement when the horses pound towards the surface line.

But this promotion code thrill of the ride is something that lots of consumers who wager in stores or online do not experience.

Bookmaker William Hill is eager to recreate it with virtual truth technology.

The UK's Gambling Commission stated that it would be keeping an eye on developments such as virtual truth to make sure that they did not motivate excessive betting.

Using virtual truth headsets, integrated with GPS racetrack data, it is offering consumers the chance to see the race from the jockey's perspective.

"Currently you position a bet and very little occurs in between that and the result," said Crispin Nieboer, William Hill's director of innovation.

"We wish to bring consumers closer to the sporting action, to experience the adventure of the trip."

To test the possibilities, the group at William Hill laboratories constructed a 3D mock-up of Kempton Park racecourse and collected live data, via GPS trackers fitted on horses, during a training race at the course.

Combining the data created a virtual race users can see via either Google Cardboard or an Oculus Rift.

The innovation is not yet offered to the general public however was on program at an open day at the firm's innovation lab in Shoreditch.

Users initially choose the horse they wish to race on. Accompanied by live commentary, wearers can turn and look at other horses along with activating a data display screen about the horse's heart rate, stride and race position.

William Hill plans to include more courses and live races next year.

"Currently there are some spaces in the information so the horses all of a sudden speed up in a live race, however we wish to have a proof-of-concept system ready by Christmas," said Mr Nieboer.

The strategy is to introduce the service as part of the William Hill app.

"Users can pick the choice to view the race as a standard video or they can be the jockey," Mr Nieboer said.

It could likewise be readily available in some betting shops, said Mr Nieboer, while Google Cardboard headsets were likely to be given out free at racecourses.

It is estimated that in the UK about 350,000 people have a betting dependency, with over ₤ 7bn spent every year.

The proliferation of online wagering has been blamed for making it much easier to bet and some feel services such as virtual truth could add to the problem.

The marketplace is regulated by the UK Gambling Commission, which stated that it "monitors development in the betting market in order to make sure operators continue to comply with the conditions of their licences".

"Operators are needed to ensure that they provide gambling in a responsible manner, which will include offering tools to enable consumers to handle their gaming activity as well as having policies and treatments in place to determine possibly problematic behaviour and communicate with customers who display that behaviour," a spokesman added.

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