Maris Catania on joining LeoVegas and what player sustainability really means

Maris Catania spent 13 years at Kindred, where she pushed early work on detecting problem gambling, then three years as a consultant, and has now joined LeoVegas Group as Director of Player Sustainability. She explains the move, why the title matters, and where industry and academia still struggle to work together.

In this episode

• She went back to an operator partly because of LeoVegas's culture of trust: if she said something should be green, they said okay, where past employers asked for proof (4:07, 4:13).

• She argues proactive responsible gambling is commercially smart: helping a person regulate their gambling from the start gives you a customer who stays longer (10:26, 10:34).

• She prefers "player sustainability" because it focuses on the player and the long term: if a behavior is sustainable, it is responsible (19:27, 19:43).

• Hearing at a conference that 60 to 80% of industry money comes from problem gamblers, she asked where the number came from, checked revenue from self-excluders and high-risk markers, and found "it's not that large" (33:49, 34:05, 34:25).

• She says newer generations know their rights and know companies are also responsible (17:29).

• Researchers face stigma working with operators; she was once asked whether her peer-reviewed research was "corrupted", and recently had an academic at the LeoVegas office explain product-risk research (49:02, 1:02:11).

Episode from Safer Gambling Talks with Šimon Vincze by Casino Guru News, published on YouTube.