The chief executive of Orbis believes their “prudent approach” of working only with companies that operate in wholly regulated gambling markets in Europe will pay dividends when it comes to forging alliances with incumbent lotteries and gaming operators in newly-regulating European markets.

Paddy Power’s deal with the Pari-Mutuel Urbain (PMU) to provide a sports-betting backend will help the Dublin-based company to sidestep the “mother of all pissing matches” in terms of marketing when the French market opens up next year, according to Breon Corcoran, the managing director of non-retail and development.

A recent conference held by the French parliament on the future of its online gaming regime highlighted some of the obstacles the draft bill faces if a reform is to be adopted by the beginning of the football World Cup in June.

Confirming promotional deals with partners including Orange and members of France’s 1998 World Cup winning team, Française des Jeux (FDJ) said it expects to deliver €1bn in sports-betting turnover this year as the French online market opens up.

Française des Jeux claims to have become the world’s second largest lottery after a 8.6 percent spike in total sales in France in 2009, while sales of state lottery products in Germany also grew by nearly 3 percent during the year.

Draft legislation to open up the French online gambling market to private competition is to be unveiled for the first time in Paris later today. Operators from across Europe will be watching for news of the applicable tax rate, and for the precise conditions for licences that are likely to be handed out before the end of this year.

PartyGaming has announced its first-ever deal with a government-controlled lottery operator after signing up Denmark’s Danske Spil for the provision of online casino and poker when that market opens in 2011.

Unibet CEO Petter Nylander is set to travel to France on Wednesday, following his decision to consent to extradition, but the debate over the position of foreign gambling operators in France has intensified radically in the past few days and Nylander will find himself in the middle of a media storm where the state monopolies are making the running.

Sportingbet chief executive Andy McIver says monopoly operators in its main European target territories would be formidable competitors were they to take full advantage of their leading positions in liberalising home markets.

The recent ‘Santa Casa’ decision from the European Court of Justice (ECJ) appears to have provided ammunition to opponents of the French government’s plans for reform of the country’s gaming market after it emerged that over 100 amendments to the legislation have been tabled by ministers opposed to the proposed liberalisation.