Ask anyone who has spent time in the global online gaming industry where the centre of gravity sits, and the answer will almost always be the same: Malta. It has been the answer for over two decades, and despite the emergence of competing jurisdictions, increasing regulatory complexity, and a shifting global landscape, it remains the answer today. The question worth asking is not whether Malta is the number one jurisdiction for online gaming. It is. The question worth asking is why, and whether that position is as unassailable as it looks.
Having worked in and around the iGaming industry for twenty-three years, and having spent that time based in Malta, advising operators and B2B providers across the full spectrum of what it takes to build and run a gaming business from this island, I have a fairly clear view of both the strengths and the limitations. This article tries to give you both, honestly, because the companies that thrive in Malta are the ones that went in with open eyes.
How Malta Got Here
Malta's dominance in online gaming did not happen by accident. It was the product of a deliberate, forward-thinking regulatory decision taken in 2004, when Malta became the first European Union member state to regulate remote gaming. At a time when most jurisdictions were either ignoring the sector or treating it with suspicion, Malta moved to create a framework. That first-mover advantage proved to be one of the most consequential regulatory decisions any small nation has made in the modern era.
The framework that followed was built on principles that the industry needed but rarely found: clarity, consistency, EU-level credibility, and a regulator, the Malta Gaming Authority, that was genuinely engaged with the commercial realities of the sector it oversaw. The Gaming Act of 2018 modernised and consolidated the regulatory framework, introducing a cleaner, more proportionate licensing structure that separated B2C from B2B activities and gave both a clear, workable pathway. That reform is widely credited with cementing Malta's status as the natural home for high-value B2B suppliers in particular.
Malta did not simply regulate gaming. It built an ecosystem around it. And two decades later, that ecosystem is arguably the most mature and well-connected in the world.
The numbers reflect it. As of the first half of 2025, gaming generated EUR 714 million in gross value added in Malta in just six months, representing 6.5 percent of total national economic output. Around 14,800 people are employed directly by MGA-licensed operators, approximately 5 percent of the entire national workforce. B2B operators now account for 55.5 percent of the total licence base, and in the first half of 2025, 87.5 percent of licences actually issued were B2B. Malta has not just attracted gaming companies. It has become the global capital of the B2B gaming supply chain.
The Licence That Opens Doors
At the heart of Malta's proposition is the MGA licence itself, and specifically the Critical Gaming Supply licence, which is the B2B authorisation that allows companies to provide gaming software, platforms, content, tools and services to other licensed operators. The value of this licence extends far beyond what it says on the document.
First and most fundamentally, Malta is an onshore EU jurisdiction. This is not a semantic point. For a B2B gaming supplier, being EU-licensed and EU-based changes the commercial conversation entirely. It means access to payment infrastructure, banking relationships, and e-wallet and payment gateway integrations that are simply unavailable or significantly restricted for offshore operators. It means being able to sit across the table from a European operator, a platform provider or a media partner and speak as equals, without the friction and credibility discount that comes with holding a licence from a jurisdiction outside the EU regulatory mainstream.
The MGA licence also appears on the UK Gambling Commission's whitelist, which is significant. It means that MGA-licensed operators can target the UK market, one of the largest and most valuable regulated gaming markets in the world, with considerably less friction than operators licensed elsewhere. The MGA's international reputation has been built through active engagement in global investigations, commitment to responsible gaming standards, and a consistent track record of robust enforcement. Holding an MGA licence is, in practice, a signal of quality that resonates across the global industry.
An MGA B2B licence is not just regulatory clearance. It is a commercial credential. When your prospective clients see it, the trust conversation starts from a different place entirely.
The corporate structure that Malta permits also deserves attention. The Corporate Group Licence allows gaming companies operating within a group structure to operate under a single MGA authorisation where the parent entity holds sufficient control. For B2B suppliers building multi-brand or multi-product structures, this reduces licensing cost and administrative overhead significantly. Multiple brands can operate under a single licence provided they are properly registered and compliant, which is a practical advantage that many operators in other jurisdictions simply do not have access to.
The Tax Framework
Corporate tax in Malta is a subject that generates more confusion than it should, so it is worth being clear about it. The headline corporate tax rate is 35 percent, which causes some operators to pause. The rate that actually applies in most cases is considerably lower. Malta operates a full imputation system that eliminates economic double taxation of company profits. When a Maltese company distributes dividends to its shareholders, those shareholders are entitled to a refund of the Malta tax charged, typically 6/7ths of the tax paid, which reduces the effective corporate tax rate to as low as 5 percent. Combined with available investment tax credits on qualifying expenditure, the effective rate can in some structures be reduced further still.
For B2B gaming operators specifically, the structure is particularly clean. B2B Critical Gaming Supply licensees are not subject to Compliance Contributions, the per-revenue charges that apply to B2C Gaming Service licensees. The cost of maintaining MGA authorisation for a B2B supplier is therefore substantially lower than for a B2C operator, which makes the jurisdiction disproportionately attractive for companies on the supply side of the industry.
Malta also has over 70 double taxation treaties in force, covering most of the world's major markets. For a B2B supplier with clients across multiple jurisdictions, this treaty network has genuine commercial value in structuring international revenue flows efficiently and compliantly.
The Ecosystem: What No Other Jurisdiction Has
Tax rates and licensing frameworks can be replicated, at least partially, by other jurisdictions. What cannot be easily replicated is twenty years of ecosystem development. Malta has built, through a combination of deliberate policy and organic industry momentum, a concentration of gaming expertise that has no real peer in the world.
The legal and regulatory advisory community in Malta is deep, specialised and genuinely expert in gaming. Law firms, compliance specialists, tax advisors, corporate service providers and licensing consultants who understand the MGA framework from the inside, who know the regulators personally, and who have guided hundreds of operators through the process, are available on the island in a density that you will not find anywhere else. This matters enormously for B2B operators, whose ongoing compliance requirements, regulatory updates and structural decisions require constant, high-quality advice.
The talent pool, though imperfect as we will address shortly, remains the deepest concentration of iGaming-experienced professionals in the world. Developers, product managers, compliance officers, affiliate managers, payments specialists, data analysts and commercial executives who understand the industry and can contribute from day one are in Malta in concentrations that reflect two decades of industry growth. The University of Malta and a network of specialist training providers have built curricula specifically designed to feed the sector's needs.
The industry event calendar is another dimension of the ecosystem that has real commercial value. SiGMA, which has grown from a Maltese industry conference into one of the most significant gaming events globally, remains anchored in Malta. ICE, G2E and a constellation of affiliate, payments and tech summits draw the industry's senior decision-makers to the island multiple times a year. For a B2B supplier, the ability to meet clients, partners, investors and regulators at events that are either held in Malta or dominated by Malta-based operators is a genuine competitive advantage.
In the online gaming industry, the relationships you build are as important as the product you build. Malta puts you in the room where those relationships happen, repeatedly and naturally.
The Honest Assessment: What Malta Is Not
Any serious article about Malta as a gaming jurisdiction has to address its limitations, because the companies that go in without acknowledging them tend to encounter them the hard way. I would rather they encounter them here.
The cost of living and the property market are the most persistent and legitimate criticisms. Property prices in Malta have risen sharply over the past decade, driven by the confluence of a booming economy, high net migration, and constrained supply on a small island. Rental costs in the areas most popular with iGaming professionals, Sliema, St. Julian's, Valletta, can be significant, and a survey by EY found that 51 percent of foreign direct investment companies in Malta cited the high cost of living as the single biggest barrier to recruiting and retaining overseas talent. This is a real constraint for operators trying to build and maintain international teams, and it requires planning rather than optimism.
The talent shortage is the other side of the same coin. Malta has a small population. While it has built an impressive concentration of iGaming expertise relative to its size, the absolute number of experienced professionals is finite. Salary inflation has been a consistent feature of the market, driven by competition among operators for a limited pool of experienced people. Junior professionals are routinely placed in roles that would require significantly more experience in larger markets, and the turnover that results has been a genuine industry challenge. Operators who build teams in Malta need recruitment strategies that account for this, including the use of recruitment platforms.
The regulatory environment, while generally praised, has become more demanding over time. The MGA's approach to compliance, AML obligations, responsible gaming requirements and reporting has intensified, particularly following broader EU-level regulatory developments. This is arguably a feature rather than a bug, since a robust regulator protects the value of the licence, but it represents a meaningful ongoing cost in terms of compliance infrastructure, qualified compliance staff, and management attention. Operators who underestimate this tend to find themselves in difficulty.
And finally, the honest reality of market access. An MGA B2B licence gives you EU credibility and strong commercial standing. It does not automatically open every market. Many European jurisdictions have moved to locally-licensed, ring-fenced markets where B2B suppliers need either a local licence or a specific approval to operate. Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, and increasingly others operate under frameworks that require more than an MGA authorisation to supply locally-licensed operators. B2B companies in Malta need clear-eyed market access strategies that account for this evolving landscape.
Malta's strengths are real and they are substantial. So are its challenges. The companies that do best here are the ones who went in knowing both and planned for both.
CSB Group: Five-Time Award Recognition
CSB Group has been part of Malta's iGaming story since the very beginning. We have worked with operators, suppliers, platform providers and technology companies across the full lifecycle of building and running a gaming business in Malta, and we have done it for long enough to have seen every iteration of the regulatory framework, every cycle of the market, and every variety of challenge that companies encounter when they arrive.
The industry's recognition of what we do has been gratifying and, we believe, genuinely earned. At the SiGMA Europe Gaming Awards, the most prestigious industry awards in our home jurisdiction, CSB Group has been recognised with these awards:
These years of recognition at SiGMA, voted on by both industry judges and the public, reflects something more than good marketing. It reflects the quality of the work, the depth of the client relationships, and the consistency of the service that our team delivers year after year. We have also been shortlisted for the Services Provider of the Year category at the Global Gaming Awards London, one of the industry's other most respected award programmes.
These awards are won by the team that our clients interact with every day. The iGaming advisory team at CSB Group, led from the front and with genuine hands-on industry knowledge, is the reason operators trust us with the decisions that matter most to their business.
The One-Stop-Shop That Actually Works
The term one-stop-shop is used liberally in the professional services world, sometimes to describe nothing more than a firm that has assembled a list of service lines on its website. At CSB Group, it describes something more specific and more useful: the ability to take a gaming company from initial enquiry to fully operational Maltese entity, and to support every aspect of its ongoing life in Malta, through a single coordinated team.
What that looks like in practice: we advise on corporate structure and jurisdiction suitability before a company commits. We handle company incorporation, directorship and company secretarial services, and ongoing corporate governance. We manage the MGA licensing application, from initial qualification assessment through documentation, submission and the approval process. We provide tax structuring advice that ensures the effective tax position reflects the full benefit available under Maltese law. We advise on employment law and assist with employment contracts, HR compliance and the relocation of key personnel. We handle banking introductions, which remain one of the most practically challenging aspects of establishing a gaming business in Malta and where our relationships and track record make a material difference.
For companies that need physical premises, our partnership with Regus Malta, accessible through regus.com.mt, provides immediate access to premium serviced office space, flexible co-working desks for arriving teams, and private offices that scale as the company grows. A company arriving in Malta with CSB Group does not need to spend its first weeks solving logistics. It can get to work.
Through Malta Sotheby's International Realty, we also assist directors, founders and senior executives who are relocating personally with their property requirements, whether that is a rental while they settle in or a purchase once they have decided that Malta is home. The personal and the professional are connected, and we treat them that way.
Every gaming company that comes to Malta will need legal advice, corporate setup, a licence, a bank account, an office, people, and somewhere to live. We cover all of it. That is not a boast. It is a description of what we do.
Our connections across the MGA, Malta Enterprise, government bodies, the legal community, the banking sector, and the broader gaming industry ecosystem mean that when a client needs something to happen, we know who to call and how to make it happen. These relationships have been built over decades of being present, active and committed to this industry and this jurisdiction. They are not something that can be replicated by a firm that arrived last year with a new gaming practice and a brochure.
Why Now
The B2B shift in Malta's gaming sector is accelerating. In the first half of 2025, 87.5 percent of licences issued were B2B. The market is maturing, consolidating, and increasingly dominated by sophisticated suppliers who understand what it means to operate at scale in a regulated European environment. The window for establishing a credible B2B gaming operation in Malta, with the right structure, the right licence, and the right advisory team behind it, remains open, but the companies that move decisively will establish positions that are increasingly difficult for later arrivals to replicate.
Malta is not perfect. Nothing worth building is. But as a base for a serious B2B gaming operation, it offers a combination of regulatory credibility, EU market access, commercial ecosystem, and professional support infrastructure that no other jurisdiction has assembled in the same way. That is why the world's most serious operators are here. And it is why, if you are thinking about where to build your next chapter, the answer keeps coming back to Malta.
If you are ready to have that conversation, my team and I are ready to have it with you.
About the Author
Roger A. Strickland Jr. is a Director at CSB Group, with responsibility for Gaming and Corporate Services. He has worked in and around the iGaming industry for twenty-three years, advising operators, B2B suppliers and platform providers on everything from initial market entry and licensing to ongoing compliance, corporate governance and commercial strategy. He has seen the Malta gaming industry from the inside across multiple regulatory cycles and through every phase of the sector's extraordinary growth.
Based in Malta and deeply embedded in its gaming, business and professional community, Roger brings a combination of long experience, genuine relationships and practical knowledge that goes well beyond what any advisory firm can deliver on paper. His approach is direct, personal and focused on outcomes. He takes the time to understand what a company is actually trying to build, and then works to make that possible in Malta in the most efficient and effective way.
Roger represents CSB Group at SiGMA, ICE and other major industry events globally, and was present at the SiGMA Europe award ceremonies where CSB Group took home recognition four years running. He leads the iGaming advisory team that has built and maintained the relationships, the track record and the reputation that underpin those wins.
