The Finnish National Police Board has already received 50 licence applications since submissions opened in March as operators gear up for the Nordic nation’s regulated, commercial market opening.
Under the new framework, applicants must pay a processing fee of €29,000, while the regulator can ask for further information around applications, including financial data.
There is no deadline for prospective operators to apply for a Finnish licence. The National Police Board said it expects applications to take around six months to be processed.
Average processing times will be updated, the regulator said.
Finland’s online gambling market is currently transitioning away from a monopoly model under Veikkaus, and is set to become fully regulated in July 2027.
Proposals for regulation were initially submitted in March 2025, and applications for licences opened on 1 March 2026. It has not been confirmed whether Veikkaus is among the operators to have applied so far.
EGR has contacted the National Police Board to ascertain which companies have applied for a licence.
Within the public domain, the likes of Hippos ATG, FDJ United, LeoVegas Group, Betsson and Paf are all set to apply for permits.
The National Police Board, which will oversee applications until 1 July 2027 when the Finnish Supervisory Agency (FSA) takes over as the regulated market opens.
Juha Katainen, senior adviser at the National Police Board, said: “The reliability and suitability of the applicants will be evaluated on the basis of documents, such as register extracts, certificates and various reports, submitted by the applicant.
“The complexity of processing and evaluating applications is affected by the fact that the majority of applicants are foreign.”
Katainen added: “We hope that applicants will avoid constantly contacting us about the processing status of their application, as answering enquiries takes time away from the processing applications.”
Last month, Veikkaus hired Ilkka Kosola, an industry newcomer from a Finnish tech consultancy, as its new CFO, following its termination of 26 roles in December.
In November, Finnish government officials suggested Veikkaus could be listed on the Nasdaq Helsinki if the operator performs well on the regulated market in 2027.
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National Police Board suggests many applications are made more complex having come from foreign operators, with commercial regulated market due to open on 1 July 2027
The post Finnish regulator says 50 licence applications have been submitted since March first appeared on EGR Intel.