The Massachusetts Gaming Commission (MGC) has set a 5 p.m. deadline today for initial applications from developers who are vying for the last casino license in the state.

As it stands, three companies, KG Urban, Crossroads Massachusetts/Somerset, and Mass Gaming and Entertainment, have submitted their application.

The New York-based KG Urban has made plans to build a Foxwoods casino on the New Bredford waterfront. Part of the plan for the company would be to secure a host community agreement with New Bredford Mayor Jon Mitchell. No resolution has been made on that front, although company spokesman Andrew Paven told the Boston Herald that the two sides have been engaged in “substantive conversations” about the proposal.

Mass Gaming and Entertainment has filed its application with the other two developers having requested extensions until today to get their proposals in order. The Rush Street Gaming, Mass Gaming’s parent firm, secured a host agreement to build a $650 million casino and hotel project on the Brockton Fairgrounds site.

Companies preparing to pitch at the popular LaunchPad competition at GiGse next month need to monitor the market closely in the build-up to their presentations, according to Rob Gallo, the CEO and founder of Neo Poker Lab, the winner of the 2014 GiGse LaunchPad.

Gallo, who this year is looking forward to enjoying a watching brief at the GiGse LaunchPad in San Francisco, California, hailed last year’s experience as “fantastic”, with the prestigious award having put the company’s “name on the map”.

Clarion Events – which is organising GiGse in partnership with GamCrowd, the industry’s crowd-funding and crowd-sourcing platform – has set a March 15 deadline for applications to participate in the LaunchPad, which will take place on April 22, the final day of the three-day GiGse event.

However, Gallo insisted that those companies that are serious about scooping the top prize should follow Neo Poker Lab’s example by initiating preparations for their presentations as soon as possible.

Gaming industry professionals have less than two weeks to enter the running for the popular LaunchPad competition at GiGse next month in San Francisco, California.

Clarion Events – which is organising GiGse in partnership with GamCrowd, the industry’s crowd-funding and crowd-sourcing platform – has reminded those interested in competing for the prestigious award that the cut-off point for applications via the www.gigse.com website is March 15.

Following the deadline, the list of real-money and social gaming start-ups will be whittled down to a final five who will pitch to an investors’ panel and an audience of potential partners on April 22 on the final day of GiGse, which will start on April 20.

The selected start-ups will receive advice on fine-tuning their pitches before being grilled by the panel of experts on the day. The winner will be selected through an audience vote.

World Snooker has announced separate title sponsorship deal with online gaming operator 888 Holdings and UK-based bookmaker Betfred.

888′s title sponsorship of Snooker’s new World Grand Prix, titled as the 888.com World Grand Prix, will take place on March 16-22 in North Wales.

The field is comprised of 32 players who qualified from a unique ranking list which ran from the 2014 World Championship to the 2015 Gdynia Open, competing for the £100,000 ($150,000) top prize

“We are thrilled to welcome 888.com on board for this fantastic new tournament. They have shown tremendous support for snooker in the past and we are pleased to continue to build that relationship,” said World Snooker Chairman Barry Hearn. “This tournament is a wonderful addition to the calendar as we will see the very best players in the world competing for the inaugural title, in Llandudno, where we know there is a great support for snooker. It’s going to be a superb week for fans in the arena and viewers at home.”

Last week’s Champions League game between Chelsea and Paris St. Germain was exciting for so many reasons but not for Sky Bet’s furious customers who cried foul when the online bookmaker failed to honor odds after PSG’s dramatic comeback to secure a place in the quarterfinals.

According to the Daily Mail, some customers were furious upon learning that Sky Bet dropped the odds of PSG winning in extra time to 9/2 after initially the bookmaker’s mobile phone app initially posted a line of 25/1. What that means is an initial bet of $1 would have paid out $25, not $4.50 on the revised odds.

Sky Bet Managing Director Richard Flint admitted that the 25/1 odds were posted incorrectly and that the company argued that its decision to drop the number when it came to paying out winning bettors was keeping in line with its terms and conditions, which explicitly says that the company reserves the right to “correct obvious errors and eaters settle bets at the correct odds or void bets.”

“Occasionally mistakes happen,” Flint added. “In this case a wrong price was displayed for around three minutes, and a small number of customers bet at the incorrect odds. These odds were clearly wrong – we showed odds of 25-1 when the true odds and the odds displayed by all other bookmakers was 9-2. We settled at the correct odds.”

If you ever had plans of winning Warren Buffet’s $1 billion March Madness bracket challenge this year, your odds of actually accomplishing just went down from highly improbable to, well, impossible.

It’s hard enough to win a challenge when you’re odds of doing so are already at 9,223,372,036,854,775,808/1 (that’s nine quintillion-to-one), but now that Buffet has cancelled the challenge altogether, the likelihood of you beating the odds has been slashed to zero.

According to CNN Money, the parties—Buffet’s Berkshire-Hathaway, Quicken Loans, and Yahoo!—involved in making the challenge last year are now embroiled in several legal disputes stemming from disagreements on who came up with the idea in the first place.

Apparently, all the trouble started when a small sweepstakes company called SCA Promotions took Yahoo to task, suing the Internet company for allegedly reneging on a deal to host a perfect bracket contest. Not one to be outdone, Yahoo filed a lawsuit of its own, alleging that SCA communicated to Berkshire about buying insurance to cover the $1 billion price in the unlikely event that somebody somehow defies the odds and wins the contest.

This is a guest contribution by SafeCharge (Israel) Ltd. General Manager Shemer Katz . If you would like to submit a contribution please contact Bill Beatty for submission details. Thank you.

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