L’Autorité Nationale des Jeux (ANJ) – France’s Unified Gambling Authority – has confirmed changes at boardroom level ahead of a review into the country’s advertising standards.
ANJ regulates licensed gambling and betting games in France, and is tasked with protecting players and ensuring that the legal gambling offer is fair and recreational.
The independent authority’s board is composed of nine members, led by President Isabelle Falque-Pierrotin, who was appointed by decree of the French President for a six-year, non-revocable term.
The President remains at the helm but will now be joined by three new Board members after the departures of Éliane Houlette, Mario Blaise and Wilfried Sand-Zantman, who all chose not to continue their duties past June 2022.
One of the new arrivals is Thomas de Ricolfis, Deputy Director of DCPJ, a subsidiary department of France’s National Police investigating financial crimes.
The second new member – Jean-Pierre Couteron – is the current administrator of France’s Fédération addiction service, and an expert in addiction treatment and patient welfare.
Data science figurehead Isabelle Bordry, Co-Founder of Retency, a company specialising in data anonymization and online protection, has also joined the Board at ANJ.
Board members at ANJ are appointed to serve a six-year tenure, in which their duties must be renewed every two-years as ‘functions for members of the ANJ college are not exercised on a full-time basis’.
The close of 2022 will see ANJ publish its review of French gambling advertising standards across all media, digital and sponsorship verticals.
ANJ’s advertising review is supported by the French media agencies of ARPP – France’s Professional Advertising Regulatory Authority, and ARCOM – the Audiovisual Communication Regulator.
During H1, all licensed sportsbook operators were required to submit action plans detailing their advertising spend for the remainder of the year.
Pierrotin warned incumbents that ANJ expected a “vast improvement on advertising activities during World Cup 2022”, following public complaints that betting operators had dominated the coverage of last year’s UEFA Euro 2020 Championship with an “oversaturation of adverts”.
