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The Game Must Go On: Virginia Lottery Optimizes and Launches New Mobile API Under Heavy Traffic Load

More Online Lottery Sales Create New Challenges

The internet is changing the way lottery does business. In the US, sales have shifted online significantly over the past three years. Global online lottery sales are projected to exceed $14 billion annually by 2026. A rapidly growing consumer base of online gamers has many states playing catch up by passing new lottery legislation and updating lottery operations.

The Virginia Lottery felt the pressure of this new wave of online purchasers and was determined to continue generating valuable revenue without putting undue pressure on their systems or impacting the overall consumer experience. Bulletproof’s comprehensive solutions framework allowed Virginia Lottery to address concerns without compromising operations, allowing for continued generation of revenue to fund education in their state.

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A Lottery That Gives Back to Its Community

When the Virginia Lottery was established in 1987, lottery proceeds were allocated to a variety of state-run efforts, however in 2000, Virginia voters overwhelmingly supported a measure that permanently directed all Virginia Lottery profits—about a third of overall sales—to be used solely for educational purposes. Since then, the Virginia Lottery has contributed over $11 billion to Virginia’s K-12 public schools, accounting for approximately 10% of Virginia’s total education budget.

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The Challenge

Like many other businesses, the Virginia Lottery experienced a desire from players to purchase online at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. The VALottery.com website began suffering from significant performance issues, especially on jackpot days. Players experienced longer wait times to complete purchases, timeouts while trying to initiate gameplay, and an inability to access parts of the site. Increasing account registrations via the website signaled that the heavy site traffic load wouldn’t let up in the near future.

In addition to this challenge, the Virginia Lottery also had new performance testing requirements. The first requirement was to obtain baseline metrics for their new API for mobile apps, which was developed by a third party. They also wanted to increase VALottery.com QA testing cycle efficiency by introducing test automation into their release management lifecycle.

With daily digital lottery sales of almost $6M, any system crash—or even system performance degradation—would have a significant negative revenue impact that would affect statewide education funding. It could also damage the Lottery’s reputation, impacting the trust their organization has earned from Virginians over the years.
 

Virginia Lottery’s Core Requirements:

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Manage website performance issues related to a sharp increase in online players 

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Conduct performance testing of new mobile API

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Increase overall QA testing efficiency with automation

The Solution

Bulletproof’s Initiate — Discover — Design — Build — Implement solutions framework helped Virginia Lottery achieve its performance and testing goals on time and on budget. Most importantly, it ensured that any implemented solution exactly met the Lottery’s requirements.
 
Our experts developed deep working relationships with the Virginia Lottery team as they used Bulletproof’s proven methodology to gain a thorough understanding of their needs before getting started.
 
Bulletproof’s team worked with the Virginia Lottery to define performance requirements, creating the parameters for a comprehensive test plan. Using this approved test plan, Bulletproof created performance test scripts and execution activities for all player-facing software, including the iLottery platform hosting mobile apps and the new mobile application API. Mobile app performance testing extended from the mobile device through to the central host delivering necessary data to drive app functionality.
 
Bulletproof provided performance monitoring and tuning services centrally throughout the testing phase and hosted a daily meeting to keep the full project team informed while performance issues were identified and resolved.
 
Upon completion of the project’s test execution phase, the Bulletproof team compiled a performance test summary report containing the baseline metrics for the mobile API project. The Virginia Lottery team was able to use this information to confidently deploy the API project to production after evaluating the baseline metrics of the system.

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The Value

The partnership between Bulletproof and the Virginia Lottery allowed each organization to focus on what they did best. The Virginia Lottery was able to confidently carry on operations, ensuring that it could consistently drive revenue for Virginia’s educational system. Bulletproof worked diligently behind the scenes, protecting the Lottery’s integrity and ability to operate, and preventing any disruption to the Lottery’s revenue streams.

The outcome was a reduction in potential API performance degradation when the system is under load, limiting the possibility of a future system shutdown. Establishing accurate baseline performance metrics also helped the Lottery monitor its systems and take necessary action when certain thresholds are reached, avoiding potential system crashes and game integrity.

Prabhakar Channal, Director of Technical Testing, Bulletproof stated "Bulletproof’s in-depth knowledge and experience in performance testing with various complex architecture has helped VA Lottery to deploy the new architecture with ease and be prepared for any unexpected user load surge on the website, allowing the lottery to continue with their operations and drive revenue to support Virginia's educational system."

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Why the Virginia Lottery Chose Bulletproof

Advances in the technology that powers lottery operations have created significant growth opportunities for lotteries, but that growth comes with an equally significant escalation in risk. Bulletproof has a lengthy and successful track record of helping companies modernize their lottery systems while simultaneously reducing threats and security risks.

Headquartered in Canada with locations across the United States and around the globe, Bulletproof has decades of technology, security, and compliance expertise, enabling lottery operations to grow profitability and build their reputation.

The lottery industry’s rapid adoption of technology in recent years has also come with escalated risks. Bulletproof has extensive experience working with lotteries and top gaming organizations to help modernize or integrate their systems and applications, manage complex projects, develop RFPs, ensure systems are thoroughly tested before going to market, and introduce new gaming sources of revenue – all while mitigating security risks. Bulletproof helps ensure lottery systems are dependable, secure, and operating smoothly. Named Microsoft’s global Security Partner of the Year in 2021 for delivering excellence and innovative end-to-end security solutions and is a member of the Microsoft Intelligent Security Association (MISA).

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Blog Post Graphic_Evolving Lottery, Evolving Risk

Evolving Lottery, Evolving Risk

Technology has transformed the lottery industry, but with that growth comes an equally significant escalation in risk. Bulletproof helps companies modernize their lottery systems and introduce new gaming sources of revenue while simultaneously reducing threats and security risks. Read the blog to learn about the three key challenges lotteries are facing today. 

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