Earlier this year, gambling industry veterans Kelly Kehn, Sue Schneider, and Paris Smith introduced Defy the Odds (DTO), an outside-the-box startup launchpad created to “propel a new wave of innovation in gaming.” By supporting underrepresented and emerging talent, DTO aims to transform the industry through empowered entrepreneurship.
Bonus spoke to Kehn, cofounder of DTO and the All-In Diversity Project, about how courting diversity can benefit the industry and its players. Like Kehn, her DTO cofounders, Schneider and Smith, also have long and lauded careers. Most recently, the pair held leadership roles at SBC and Pinnacle.
Kehn told Bonus that, right now, there is a “big, big opportunity to support women and marginalized founders” in the gambling space. It’s good timing, having reached a point where “innovation is stagnating,” and mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are taking off, she said.
She said now is the time to support underrepresented entrepreneurs and show big corporations why embracing a diversity of people and ideas is good for the bottom line.
Kehn said the response she and her cofounders have received to DTO’s creation has been “overwhelming and good.”
At this point, DTO hasn’t had to look far for startups. Though women and other marginalized founders often get left out of the spotlight, they are out there, Kehn said. And DTO believes there are others. It’s those innovators the trio aims to find and develop.
Kehn said that opening the door to new people and ideas will only benefit the industry overall.
A diverse portfolio, founders, diverse funding teams outperform. They’re bringing a much different perspective… We can make the pie bigger.
DTO courts fresh ideas, bold perspectives
As Kehn and her cofounders make clear, Defy the Odds believes that “fresh perspectives and bold ideas” will define gaming’s future. According to its website, the launchpad seeks to identify and support emerging talent, particularly underrepresented founders, who add unique perspectives and creativity.
By connecting these underserved innovators with investors, partners, and mentors, DTO aims to help the companies they work with turn “groundbreaking” ideas into “market-leading products.”
Kehn said that as a global business, gambling will always need innovation. One way to foster that required reinvention is to ensure that good ideas find support no matter where they come from. She also said it’s essential we talk to diverse audiences.
While efforts to diversify the C-Suite, like those at All-In, have gained ground in recent years, Kehn said entrepreneurship has much further to go.
Women, minorities, are not being talked to about entrepreneurship.
Even for those who do take the plunge, starting a business is often lonely, said Kehn. And it can take a while to build up a network.
It is helpful to have someone on your side and to be able to call in an army.
That’s where DTO can help. Access to its decades of combined experience and deep industry connections is likely invaluable to the companies Kehn and her co-conspirators take on. And they do it in exchange for advisory fees and some equity in launchpad companies.
Innovation needs a fighting chance
As of Kehn’s Dec. 4 conversation with Bonus, she said Defy the Odds was officially working with two companies with “probably” another four in the wings.
When supporting underrepresented entrepreneurs, DTO isn’t about needing a particular type of person to reach a specific demographic. Instead, it’s about ensuring a richness of perspectives on hand to ensure anything overlooked can be recognized and addressed.
I think when you have a certain lived experience (as a woman, for example), it’s likely that you can more easily see the gaps in service and fill those with a better product, improved marketing, or user experience.”
I definitely don’t think men should focus on men and women on women…
It’s very easy to curate a world for yourself that only includes people like you, but that is bad for innovation and growth. To innovate, we need to be able to challenge each other’s perspectives.
To that end, Kehn said she doesn’t expect DTO’s entire portfolio to be only women and minorities.
It doesn’t have to be one-sided. This is about making the pie bigger and making sure people who need funding get the funding. But especially when not getting the funding comes down to who you are or what you look like.
For DTO, it’s about giving the overlooked—whether people or ideas—a fighting chance.
As Kehn said during a recent appearance on the Betting Startups Podcast (BSU), the industry has a real opportunity to stay relevant and create jobs and innovation by addressing the full spectrum of demographics.
That’s what sustainability is, and that’s what we need to be focusing on.
Representation matters
In speaking with Bonus, Kehn also highlighted the power of representation.
How important is it to have those role models? We see it in sports; we see it in business. We see it in all records that have ever been broken. Once one falls, then everyone can sort of follow along.
The same applies to business.
In the same BSU episode, DTO cofounder Schneider used the gambling industry’s growing interest in women—as a product and an audience—as an example.
Already, companies like the Ontario-facing Betty online casino are prioritizing a female audience. However, operators have to catch up on betting options for women’s sports. But odds are, once they see revenue potential, a more concerted effort to fill the gap won’t take long.
Said, Schneider:
Operators out there are now seeing, ‘Oh, that’s a whole another population that we could market to, the same with women’s sports… All of this is coming to a head right now and is finally gaining some steam.
Our feeling is, it’s the right time… We’re just hoping that the industry will show an appetite to be open to the kind of folks that we might bring them… Whether it’s for investment, whether it’s for use as a customer, whether it’s a partnership…
The idea is to go out and identify some of these founders and say, you know, if you’re looking to come into this particular market, that’s something that we can help with.
More good ideas mean everyone benefits
A more diverse gaming industry should result in better products for players. That could mean more user-friendly interfaces, expanded game choice and betting markets, stronger player protections, or more effective, safer gambling tools (among endless possibilities).
In the near term, to help facilitate those changes, DTO is building out an online startup community to support its launchpad businesses 24/7. Mid-term, Kehn said the DTO team wants to work with larger corporations, encouraging collaboration with startups on their business challenges.
Looking further, DTO hopes to see its mentorees reach their long-term goals, whether achieving series A or B funding, going public, or making a good exit.
At some point, Kehn and Schneider referenced building an internal investment fund to allow for direct investment.
As Smith told BSU during DTO’s episode, she ultimately hopes that people with good ideas will come forward, knowing they will be heard.
I think through that, we’re going to get some really interesting and exciting problem-solving type ideas in the future.
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