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I'm Ricardo Valente

Igaming Guru.

SportsBook. Poker. Casino.

Based in Malta.

About Me
Ricardo Valente pic

Over a decade of passion, dedication, and experience in the Igaming sector, both from the player perspective and the business side.

During my career I always aimed to predict the mid/long-term impact of every decision and when adequate always with a creative mindset by rethinking the status quo. Pairing this with my very strong organizational skills based on my extensive experience in multiple fields of Igaming, Product and others, led me to my current role as a Product Leader where I’m now able to strategically create a vision and mission that fits the direction of the rest of the business.

As a product person I always push to reimagine the standard ways of poker, sportsbook, esports and casino products. Currently exploring new concepts such as customization fit for certain segmentation defined from the business side or empowering the users to customize their own journey.

Mixing my team-player personality together with my leadership skills, I’ve become a very capable leader able to build from scratch top performance teams while nourishing a healthy and collaborative work environment.

From web-developer, motion-grapher, teacher, poker player, sports/eSports data, resources allocator, program manager, bot hunter, manager, product manager, leader and head of product - I believe that my mix of skills together with my Igaming professional experience makes me a very versatile candidate to embrace different kind of challenges in this sector.
#Sportsbook - #Esports - #Poker - #Casino - #Manager - #Data - #Culture - #Leader - #SportsData

  • Name: Ricardo Valente
  • Age: 39 Years
  • Job: Igaming Specialist
  • Citizenship: Portuguese
  • Residence: Malta
  • E-mail: valentework@gmail.com
Download CV



Bullet Points

Following you can see some bullet points related to some achievements in terms of Product and Leadership:

@Sportradar/Betradar:
- With a team of 5 managed the start and the end point of the core product from SportRadar, including a statistical product that was later integrated with Google;
- Created a global efforts calculation tracker for Esports as a vertical;
- Used research and forecast models to predict operational demand vs capacity;

@Pokerstars:
- As a Game integrity manager, I’ve managed initially a team of 10 that was later restructured to a team of 5;
- Datacentric analysis and data visualizations work;
- As a product person, took solo ownership of 4 internal complex products with 3 development teams;
- Defined the strategy and vision for the Game integrity product department;
- Created the roadmap for mid term and defined possible scenarios for long term;
- For Game Integrity Product, I’ve built a long term organizational structure together with career path and hired accordingly – team of 3;
- Conducted competitive analysis corelated with a user centric approach to define the best product-market fit;
- Reached a max score in terms of Capability Maturity Model in terms of software development process and people management;
- Helped Define the poker product KPIs, KRs and OKRs based on the company mission and vision;
- Led part of the Pokerstars Product agile transformation;
- Fostered a healthy and collaborative work environment across different teams;
- Reported directly to the Director of Online Poker Experience at Pokerstars

@JoiGaming:
- Created a product framework suitable for JOI with a centralized way of doing product;
- Defining new ways of working with internal and external stakeholders;
- Opex and Capex budgeting;
- P&L reporting;
-Casino and Sportsbook product management;
- Build and hired a product team from scratch suitable for the product framework in place;
- Web, mobile web and App experience;
- Won the online casino of the year (onlinecasinovanhetjaar.nl) with JACKS.NL;
- Helped define JOI gaming strategy and vision together with the rest of the management team and the Board.
- In a centralized way of doing Product i’ve handle all the departments: Marketing, Gaming, SportsBook, all the sub-departments from Operations, Compliance, Data/Bi and Finance
- Exploring customizations and gamifications using a costumer-centric approach;
Experience
01/2023 - Present
Head of Product - JOI Gaming - JACKS.NL

Head of Product
Defining and creating a product framework suitable for JOI.
Creating new ways of working (internal and external).
Defining the product Budget, opex and capex.
P&L experience.
Acquisition and retention experience.
PoC for internal Stakeholders and external inbound.
Building a stable mid-term structure for the product team with a career path.

Product Audit, reviewing all the technology, data architecture, components, flows and UI/UX of the main site.
Creating an expansion plan for additional brands.
Customization – segmented approach vs user defined.
Gamification - acquisition and retention tools.

“Conversions are down, it must be the registration-flow”

08/2021 - 12/2022
Game Integrity Services - StarsGroup

Product Manager
Managing multiple internal products.
Roadmap creation aligned with the stakeholder needs and company vision.
Built and managed a team of 3 product people.
Created a new development squad.
Creating mid/long term structure for the team GI product team.
Creating complex business plans to support new and ongoing products.
Supporting the technical side when building new development squads.
Sampling ecosystems for different game formats and player pools.

Poker Product Leadership team - Defining Poker Product KPIs, KRs and OKRs.
Poker Product Leadership team - Leading part of the Pokerstars agile transformation in the poker tribe.
Poker Product Leadership team - Reaching a top score in terms of capability maturity model for the software development squads.

Agile what?

01/2021 - 08/2021
Game Integrity Services - StarsGroup

Game Integrity Services - Bot Manager.
Point of contact between departments.
Defining new business requirements.
People Manager

Bye bots, Hi humans

12/2019 - 12/2020
Game Integrity Services - StarsGroup

Senior bot specialist.
Continuing the fight against malicious AI and Bots.

"Blade Runner"

08/2018 - 12/2019
Game Integrity Services - StarsGroup

Bot specialist.
Data-driven bot hunter capable of achieving high complex thinking on a regular basis.

Problem solver is my middle name

2017 - 2018
Program Manager - Betradar (powered by Sportradar)

Vital for the operational level of the Sportradar giant. Tasks segmentation and allocations, documentation, implementing new methodologies.

Dealing with pressure became like riding a bike

2016 - 2017
Planning and eSports data - Betradar (powered by Sportradar)

Predicting needed resources and daily micro-managing over 150 operators around the globe.

The resources allocator

2013 - 2016
Real-time Data Supervision - RunnigBall

Real-time Sports data supervision.

NHL is fun

2009 - 2013
Poker Player/Coach - Freelancer

Coach for a Portuguese/Brazilian community.

Learning about Variance...the hard way

2011 - 2012
Web Developer - Freelancer

Website development. HTML5 + CSS3 , Javascript . ActionScript 2.0 ActionScript 3.0.

If you are reading this now it means I learned something right

2010
IT Teacher - Castro Daire High School

Investigation, conception, planning, execution and evaluation the students. Teaching from 7th to 12th grade students the basics of hardware and software knowledge on information and communication technologies sector.

Life is now simple

2009
Web Developer & Montion Grapher - PortaLogica (internship)

Web Development. Motion graphics for web/multimedia communication. ActionScript 2.0. HTML + CSS. Adobe After Effects. Adobe Premier.

Don't render heavy After Effects projects using your personal computer

2008
Flash Animator - Freelancer

Flash animation development for digital educational book collection. ActionScript 2.0

It was a good run flash, rest now

Education
2005 - 2009
Information and Communication Technologies @University of Aveiro

Interdisciplinary course focusing on business and information system planning and implementation. Noteworthy subjects: programming (Javascript) Database (SQL, MS SQL Server) Intranet planning and evaluation, human-computer interaction, static digital image studies, new business models

2002 - 2005
Computer and Telematics Engineering (3 years attendant) @University of Aveiro

Focusing on applied computer science, the main subjects of study included mathematics, science and economics, along with technological knowledge and skill in the application of programming languages and software processes, to design, analyse, implement and test software systems and applications.

Igaming Experience
  • SportsBook
    100%
  • Poker
    100%
  • Casino
    100%
Languages Skills
  • Portuguese
    100%
  • English
    98%
  • Spanish
    60%
Contact me for more details
Phone

+ (356) 7900 0107

Email

valentework@gmail.com