Carmen Media, who is most well known for their highly esteemed network of Belle Rock Entertainment online casinos, including Lucky Nugget Casino and River Belle, has signed a licensing agreement with online mahjong software provider, GigaMedia. The deal marks Carmen Media's possible entrance into the Asian internet gambling industry, where Mahjong continues to be the most popular betting game amongst the Asian populace. GigaMedia made the news known yesterday via a press release.

The non-exclusive licensing agreement allows Carmen Media to operate a real money gambling platform featuring GigaMedia's mahjong software for an unspecified duration. This deal is one of the more high profile partnerships for the gaming firm, who also licenses software to Everest Poker, Everest Online Casino and Grand Virtual Casino. GigaMedia's Director of Communications, Brad Miller, referred to the game of mahjong as the "poker of Asia", and said that Carmen Media will be a stepping stone for making this game available to the rest of the world.

Indeed it is exciting to think about the prospects of a sectored betting game being picked up by reputable online casinos and offered to the global internet betting community. Considering the major success of online mahjong in Asia (especially that of GigaMedia's FunTown casual games site, which is the world's leading mahjong revenue producing site on the Web), the chances that mahjong will develop a strong following in other areas of the world are highly likely.

In addition to the high level of non-Asian exposure that Carmen Media will likely be bringing to online mahjong, GigaMedia has announced that it is offering their sophisticated software suite to other online casino licensees engaging in real money internet betting activities. While online mahjong may not necessarily achieve the level of popularity that internet poker has in the Western world, it certainly is likely to develop a fan base on par with that of keno or other sectored online casino games.