Poker Writer
The Italian Series of Poker (ISOP) has partnered with PokerStars to expand the reach of the ISOP throughout Europe. The ISOP has long been the premier poker series in Italy, existing since 2009. Since 2011, it has been organizing the Italian Poker Championship each year. Now the ISOP is looking to expand its name, and it believes partnering with PokerStars is the way to do it.
The inaugural event for the partnership take place from October 21-27 at a familiar location: the Casino di Campione. It will be the third PokerStars-hosted event at that casino this year. The success of the first two may have inspired PokerStars to put more focus on the Italian market through this partnership.
“Assopoker” quoted ISOP founder Giangia Marelli discussing the importance of brand growth for the ISOP with PokerStars: (translated from Italian)
It is necessary to study history in order to understand the steps required to make what you have created truly great. By learning the stories of figures such as John Duthie and Jack Binion, and the major brands that made them famous, I realized that a natural step in the growth and establishment of the Italian Series of Poker in history would be a partnership with one of the world’s leading online poker brands, PokerStars
First Stop and Previous Events in Casino di Campione
The partnership with PokerStars allows players to qualify for ISOP live events through online qualifiers.
The full schedule of the opening stop has not been released yet, but it is known that the ISOP Championship Main Event will take place from Oct. 22 to 27 with a €500 buy-in.
That exact location in Northern Italy on the shores of Lake Lugano has hosted recent PokerStars events already this year. The PokerStars Open was held there in March, followed by the PokerStars Italian Challenge in July.
PokerStars was happy with the numbers at both of those series, particularly in March, where the Main Event drew 2,419 entries, making it the largest PokerStars Open Main Event ever. Adrian State of Romania won that event for about $400,000.
Alexander Mazza, Games Director at Casino di Campione had this to say about the upcoming series:
The ISOP – Italian Series of Poker are now a point of reference on the Italian live scene and we are proud to host them at Campione d’Italia, together with PokerStars
PokerStars History in Italy
PokerStars has always had an interest in Italian poker, but its presence for live events has waxed and waned. The Southern European nation of 59 million is one of the premier locations for poker players in Europe. Italy has produced some of the best players in the world, including Dario Sammartino and Mustapha Kanit.
In 2009, at the height of online poker’s popularity, PokerStars launched the “PokerStars Italia Poker Tour,” which later simplified its name to just the Italian Poker Tour (IPT). The IPT held events across Italy in Sanremo and Venice. It also included ventures outside of Italian borders in the enclave micro-state nation of San Marino and even Slovenia. However, it dropped the series in 2015, shortly after going public by way of a reverse merger with Canadian slots developer Amaya. The Amaya era was characterized by cost-cutting measures, including the wildly unpopular cancellation of the Supernova rewards program. Dropping the Italian series may have likewise been an example of pruning by Amaya management.
PokerStars building a stronger foothold in Italy is consistent with their desires for international priorities over any focus in the United States. This partnership with the ISOP along with the expansion of the PokerStars Open into Namur, Belgium, Manchester, UK and Cannes, France shows their focus remains on Europe for their bread and butter.
