Meet our Client
Genting Casino is a world-class casino operator dating back to 1965. With over 55 years of history, multiple awards, and 34 local casinos throughout the UK, they’re one of the most renowned names in the gaming business.
Genting also has an extensive 5000-strong iGaming catalog of video slots, jackpots, and live dealer games.
The challenge of keeping up with rapid growth
When SENLA partnered with Genting, the company was initiating its rapid digital expansion in Europe.
With the establishment of Genting Malta, their focus was on growing the European online presence from a new Malta headquarters. They also wanted to reshape the consumer experience for the UK customers, who had already been playing with Genting since 2008.
Genting sought an experienced technical partner, faced with the need to quickly transform both internal and external systems.
SENLA, with its broad tech expertise across various sectors, was happy to collaborate with Genting.
“We continue to invest significantly in the online business as we look to lead the way in innovating in this space. We’re working with cutting-edge game developers and technology providers.”
Meet the team
For Genting, we rapidly assembled a dedicated team of 8 diverse specialists, including manual and automation testers, front-end, back-end, and full-stack developers.
Our ability to provide a multi-technology team within just 10 working days was a key factor that attracted the Client. Another strength was our experts' seamless and quick integration with Genting’s in-house teams.
The project took two years and included CRM modification, main website transformation, and outsourced software testing.
Managing games on the website
With an impressive library of over 5000 titles, Genting needed to enhance its admin tools to present the games to players more effectively.
The goal was to accelerate and modify their existing PHP-based admin tool, Craft CMS. The upgrade would be twofold:
- Front end: Update the CMS tool for adding games to make it more friendly and fast.
- Back end: Manage the rewritten tool and its integration with game providers through APIs.
To ensure effective management and adherence to the planned development timeline, the project was divided into several stages. The work was organized according to the Agile methodology with 2-week sprints.
Front end
Project steps
1. Proof-of-concept: Developed for the Client’s operations team using Redux and GraphQL.
2. First feature batch: Single-page application to display games with their statuses.
3. Second feature batch: Collections and drag-and-drop functionality.
4. Integration: Connections between front-end queries and back-end processes.
Our front-end developers modified Genting's tool for game content management. This tool allowed the Client’s staff to display games, manage their statuses, and organize them into collections using drag-and-drop for effortless navigation both within and between games.
The task required separating the content management section from Craft CMS (written in PHP) and then rewriting it using React, TypeScript, and GraphQL to make it work faster. It also involved transitioning from a monolithic to a microservices architecture.
We worked closely with the Client's lead developer, an expert in Craft CMS. He advised us on segmenting and rewriting parts of the PHP code. Together, we designed technical solutions and assessed and prevented potential development risks.
Back end
The back-end developers managed the integration of the game content functionality with external game providers via APIs and shared databases.
First, they had to convert data received from partners into a format compatible with Craft CMS. Then, they programmed all content management, such as merging games into collections and adding them to the website.
Additionally, our experts optimized the number of queries between the front-end and back-end for better performance.
“The thing we did like a lot is how cleanly these different [game] variations were organized. Genting Casino Online had them all neatly arranged in different sections and what appeared to be by order of popularity. They had a look and feel of a professional operation.”
Enhancing the player experience
The goal of Genting’s website revamp was to improve the online casino’s presentation and functionality.
Here, SENLA’s team made significant changes on both the front end and back end.
Besides dedicated developers, a full-stack developer also joined the team at this stage.
SENLA performed a wide range of tasks on the project, including:
- Creating a new jackpots page.
- Developing a page dedicated to responsible gambling.
- Implementing a document-based user verification service.
- Transitioning to the Formik UI library.
- Integrating Zendesk for customer support.
- Enhancing and testing the loyalty system.
- Redesigning various pages, such as registration and personal data editing forms.
- Adding and customizing modal windows, new pages, buttons, and fields.
Additionally, the team conducted regression testing for bi-weekly releases and parallel testing of new features.
"In this project, we ran into some ordinary issues like sparse documentation, confusing old code, and less-than-ideal architecture. But these kinds of problems are pretty common in our line of work, and we at SENLA have solid skills for tackling and sorting them out effectively."
Setting up the auto-testing process
Genting was gearing up for a significant increase in users from Europe.
They needed comprehensive testing of the system to ensure it could handle the volumes.
SENLA was tasked with developing a thorough testing plan, including creating and automating all kinds of tests (smoke, end-to-end, performance, stress, staging, production, etc.). Additionally, our AQA specialists provided mentorship to Genting’s auto-testers.
We established a complete infrastructure for test execution and reporting. This included suggesting testing strategies, creating automated scenarios, and promptly addressing any issues.
Our experts made several important adjustments to optimize the testing process:
- To address privacy concerns, given the sensitive nature of the data, we meticulously built a secure internal testing environment from the ground up.
- To test the different regional versions — each requiring access through local IPs — we developed a system of saving cookies based on the region, successfully overcoming the access limitations.
The value: Well-presented games and enhanced website encouraged repeat plays
Following the successful completion of SENLA’s work, Genting experienced a notable rise in user engagement, revenue, and new sign-ups across Europe.
Besides, our solutions have contributed to other major improvements for the Client’s business:
- Easy game content management allowed the staff to quickly and conveniently present the games to users, increasing engagement.
- Seamless integration with game providers resulted in faster loading speed, longer play sessions, and a smooth gaming experience across all devices.
- Redesigned website, prioritizing ease of use, directly contributed to higher user sign-ups and repeat visits.
- Thorough testing ensured a reliable platform, minimizing downtime and glitches.
Ready to hit the software jackpot? Contact us today to discover how SENLA can enhance your iGaming platform.