Golden Realms

About Golden Realms

Baldwin and fellow casino entrepreneur Shawn Scott arrived in Laos in 2007 with ambitious plans to build a casino business aimed partly at customers crossing the country’s borders.

The pair established Sanum Investments and partnered with Laotian conglomerate ST Group. Baldwin later testified that the investors initially committed around $7.5 million to the venture, which envisaged two casino resorts and several slot clubs.

Their biggest success was Savan Vegas, strategically located near the Friendship Bridge linking Laos with neighboring Thailand across the Mekong River. A planned second resort, Paksong Vegas, was never built.

How to play Golden Realms

Akolade said the ARGN was established to address the fragmented nature of responsible gambling efforts across Africa and create a platform for greater collaboration between organisations working in the space.

“ARGN was created because problem gambling is becoming a bigger issue across Africa and most responsible gambling efforts still happen within individual countries,” Akolade tells iGB. “While many organisations are doing great work, there has been limited opportunity to learn from each other, share research, or work together on common challenges.

“We felt there was a gap for a continent-wide network that could connect organisations, encourage collaboration, and help build a stronger collective voice on player protection. ARGN is not here to replace national organisations or regulators. Its purpose is to support and strengthen the work already being done by bringing people and organisations together.”

How to play Golden Realms

Arjan Blok, CEO of Nederlandse Loterij, emphasised the importance of player protection in a statement this week.

“Skyhills uses devious advertising, including on TikTok, explicitly targeting Dutch players, especially young people. Players there gamble without any safeguards and face all associated risks,” he said. 

“This is unacceptable. It is encouraging to see Skyhills go offline immediately after our initial action.”