What we do
From our recently refurbished offices in North London we work with several consultants from all over the world. With some clients who are looking to out-smart the sports betting markets, and 2 top-flight football teams looking to out-smart their opponents, there is always a huge range of exciting and interesting projects on the go!
The industries in which we operate are dynamic and fast-paced, and the challenge of helping our clients maintain their edge as they evolve – and to be part of a hugely talented team of people doing so – are just two of the reasons why we have an excellent employee retention rate!
We are firm believers that our employees are the primary reason for our continued success. Creating and maintaining a working environment that allows them to flourish, is integral to what we do. Led by our Employee Forum, we are always on the lookout for new benefit schemes & recreational initiatives – to add to our current A-List Benefits such as our In-House Chef, a Masseuse & Weekly 5-a-side football kickabouts!
These are just a few of the reasons why Smartodds remains a truly awesome place to work and play!
Our Values
At Smartodds, we are very proud of the employee culture we have carefully cultivated and nurtured over time. The foundation of this culture rests upon our four core employee values, which are:
- Bold
- Open-minded
- Ownership
- Togetherness
Our Teams
You may think we all work separately, but in fact at Smartodds, we all often work on projects together – collaboration means acceleration!
Quantitative Research
Statistical modelling and data-driven analytics are at the forefront of everything we do at Smartodds. Every team member has a strong academic background in a related field, combined with a wealth of experience developed over many years working on sophisticated models in a topic we all love – sports.
When working on a specific problem, our team has the opportunity to research the solution with a high degree of flexibility and independence. This approach often generates novel, interesting and exciting ideas which in turn lead to brand new avenues of research. Those avenues ultimately result in stronger analysis and more accurate predictions for our clients.
Staying on top of the latest developments and techniques in the wider statistics world is crucial for us, and we frequently attend external conferences as well as hosting regular internal talks, to maximise collaboration and knowledge-share across the wider business. There is genuinely “No “I” In Team” at Smartodds.
Software Development
The software development team sits within our R & D department. Their main roles are to ensure that data flows through our systems in a highly performant manner and to provide intuitive user interfaces and API’s.
The team builds and maintains software for other departments within Smartodds and its various clients and consists of a range of Engineers, QA’s and Product Managers from a broad spectrum of backgrounds and interests. These include betting, fin-tech trading and just a general love of sport and software. There’s always plenty of work to be done be it developing a new trading interface for a client or working to process our prices to clients a few milliseconds faster. The team have the freedom to choose the best technologies and processes for the jobs in hand but never tend to stray too far away from the bleeding edge.
Our developers enjoy working here as it demands a high level of aptitude building complex trading software but without any of the red tape associated with more traditional financial institutions.
Data Team
The Data Team is, unapologetically, one of Smartodds’ most important teams. Our research and models are only as strong as our data is accurate, and it’s our Data Team’s responsibility to ensure we are reliably receiving a vast quantity of quality data.
Our Data Team sifts through petabytes and petabytes of data to ensure its quality, using a variety of techniques within the worlds of SQL, R, Python and more to find discrepancies and clean up data from hundreds of thousands of teams and millions of fixtures. Doing all of this while maintaining focus on the future to find more effective ways of obtaining, utilising and exposing the data.
Whether it’s deep-dive database development in SQL, exposing and visualising data through programming languages, or checking contrasting statistics from our source-providers using in-house management apps, no stone gets left unturned when it comes to the Smartodds Data Team.
Bet Advisory Team
Our Bet Advisory Team are the interface between our clients and the global sports betting markets. Primarily responsible for executing our client’s bets, they also communicate regularly with clients on game day to feedback real-time information about how they are seeing the market evolve, and supporting them in adapting their strategy accordingly.
Their alertness combined with an ability to work well under pressure allows our clients to maximise their opportunities in markets where the odds can move drastically in a very short period of time.
Set in a fast paced environment, with constant communication between clients, analysts and other members of the team, all whilst keeping their fingers on the pulse… being a member of the Bet Advisory Team is not for the faint-hearted. However the proximity to the action, and the ability to have such a direct and tangible influence on client profits certainly make it one of the most invigorating roles in the business!
Analysis
Want to know who Vissel Kobe’s reserve left back is? Ask our Japanese Analyst!
Our in-house football analysts – ably supported by consultants across the globe – all have an encyclopedic knowledge of the game and are true experts in their league. They’re responsible for writing previews and reviews of matches and supporting our clients to ensure they’re up to date on all the latest game-day information they need to make their final betting decisions.
We’re big believers in our employees developing a diverse range of skill sets, and as such many of our analysis team members have also been trained up in additional roles to help support other areas of the business, such as Watcher Operations and the Bet Advisory Team.
Watcher Operations
In the early days of Smartodds, our experts identified a number of key pieces of data that were most informative when it came to predicting matches in football, and set up a team of watchers to record this data exclusively for us and our clients.
As well as recording data to feed into our models and analysis, our watchers will engage with our clients during matches to provide them with real-time updates and information to support their in-play betting.
Whilst we work with watchers from all over the world, our Watcher Operations team are based in our London offices and take ultimate responsibility for the quality of the data recorded. Their regular tasks range from training and reviewing watchers, organising coverage for the busy football schedule, and running quality control on the data to ensure a high level of accuracy.
Other Departments
So, having read all about our Quant Team and Watcher Operations, you are thinking that’s where all the fun is had, right? Well not all of it! In terms of the 3 “P” s – these teams deliver the “Product.”
We, in Head Office, like to see ourselves as the “fudge” or “glue” that gives our highly valued employees those other 2 “P” s – the right “People” and the right “Process” to deliver the best possible “Product.” So, who are we?
Client Application Support – we handle all troubleshooting relating to our Client’s infrastructure and plan for and deliver preventative maintenance solutions to ensure optimal platform stability.
IT – we host all of the hardware and software developed and user internally and externally, as well as responding to the IT needs of our employees – be it troubleshooting issues on employee platforms to equipping employees with the right tools and systems to deliver.
Finance – we provide the financial information that other business functions require to operate effectively and efficiently and we also support business planning and decision-making across the company.
Facilities – we ensure that our employee’s place of work, be it in the office or from home, is the best possible working environment – some of our amazing benefits such as lunches and dinners, sporting events, work events would not be possible without our team!
HR – we ensure that employee life cycle is a well-oiled machine and runs smoothly.