MGA B2B Gaming Licence: Fees, Process & Timing (2026)
Obtaining an MGA B2B gaming licence is one of the most strategic moves a serious iGaming supplier can make to achieve long-term credibility in regulated markets. In Malta, the regulator structures B2B licensing under the Critical Gaming Supply Licence, which applies to suppliers whose technology, systems, and game content support the operation, control, or regulatory record-keeping of online gaming.
This is not a “light-touch” authorisation. The Malta Gaming Authority (MGA) expects B2B applicants to demonstrate fitness and propriety, financial sustainability, and sound governance. It also expects a technical environment that matches the documentation the applicant submits. The MGA’s formal application process includes a fit and proper review and a funding review. It also includes a business plan and policies assessment, followed by a technical set-up review and an external system audit.
What an MGA B2B Gaming Licence Covers
An MGA B2B licence is formally the Critical Gaming Supply Licence. The MGA explains that a gaming service licence is business-to-consumer (B2C), while a critical gaming supply licence is business-to-business (B2B) and relates to supplying or carrying out a “critical gaming supply.”
In practice, this licence is commonly associated with game studios, RNG-related game content, platform and back-office providers, and infrastructure or control systems that directly support licensed gaming operations.
The MGA also clarifies that once it awards a licence, operators may offer multiple “gaming verticals” under the same approval. However, each vertical requires prior authorisation to ensure the product complies with legal and regulatory objectives.
Who Typically Needs an MGA B2B Licence
The “who needs it” question matters because B2B licensing is not meant for every vendor in the ecosystem. A payment provider, a marketing agency, or a basic web-hosting service may fall outside the critical supply definition, depending on the facts. However, the MGA specifically frames B2B licensing for providers involved in game supply and back-office systems. It also groups gaming “verticals” into Gaming Types (Type 1 to Type 4) for licensing and regulatory calculations.
As a working rule, if your product is a material element of a game, influences outcomes, manages essential records, or forms part of the control system, you should assume the MGA will treat it as critical supply until proven otherwise.
The Four Gaming Types and Why They Matter for B2B
Even as a B2B supplier, your intended scope is organised around the MGA’s four Gaming Types. The MGA’s B2B guidance page lists them clearly: Type 1 includes casino-style games and lotteries; Type 2 covers fixed odds betting; Type 3 includes pool betting and peer-to-peer formats; Type 4 relates to controlled skill games.
This matters because the MGA often uses gaming types to assess risk and structure controls. The approach sits within an EU legal environment shaped by CJEU online gambling jurisdiction principles. Even when fee structures are fixed or revenue-based, the MGA still expects you to define exactly what you supply. You must also specify which type(s) your supply relates to. This allows the Authority to evaluate whether your policies, technical architecture, and governance fit your scope.
Eligibility and Corporate Setup for an MGA B2B Application
The MGA states that any company incorporated in the EU/EEA can apply for a gaming licence. The company must meet share capital and financial reporting requirements.
Most B2B applicants incorporate a Maltese entity. This helps when they want substance in Malta and smoother operational interaction with the regulator and local service providers. Many follow the Malta company formation process for this set-up. However, eligibility is not limited to Maltese-incorporated entities, as the MGA guidance explicitly references EU/EEA companies.
That said, corporate structure must be consistent with the application narrative. If your shareholding, control, or funding appear unclear or unstable, delays often follow. The MGA conducts fit and proper checks on shareholders, UBOs, and key persons, and it runs probity investigations with national and international regulatory bodies.
Minimum Share Capital for an MGA B2B Licence
For an MGA B2B critical gaming supply licence, the MGA requires minimum issued and paid-up share capital of €40,000.
This point matters in practice because the MGA does not treat capital as a box-ticking item. In 2025, the MGA issued a dedicated Capital Requirements Policy. It confirms that the minimum share capital requirement for Critical Gaming Supply remains €40,000. It also clarifies that minimum share capital includes issued and paid-up share capital and share premium reserves. The licensee must maintain this position throughout the duration of the licence.
If your group structure involves multiple entities (for example, a corporate group licence arrangement), the MGA also explains the options. One entity can satisfy the minimum share capital requirement. More than one entity within the group can also satisfy it jointly. The entities do not need to contribute equal amounts.
MGA B2B Licence Fees You Must Budget For
When people ask about fees, they often mean the government fees paid to the Authority, not professional fees. The MGA’s official guidance note on fees confirms a one-time, non-refundable licence application fee of €5,000.
After approval, the licensee must pay the annual licence fee before the MGA issues the licence. The fee is then payable annually throughout the licence period. The licensee pays it upfront in advance, and it remains non-refundable.
For B2B critical gaming supply licensees, the MGA sets the annual licence fee based on annual revenue. The official figures are €25,000 where annual revenue does not exceed €5,000,000, €30,000 where annual revenue exceeds €5,000,000 but does not exceed €10,000,000, and €35,000 where annual revenue exceeds €10,000,000.
If you are licensed specifically as a B2B back-office provider, the MGA fee guidance provides an annual licence fee of €3,000 where annual revenue does not exceed €1,000,000, and €5,000 where annual revenue exceeds €1,000,000.
The MGA’s also notes a specific annual licence fee of €10,000 for providers supplying solely Type 4 gaming supplies.
These are core MGA fees. They do not include your third-party system audit cost, legal and compliance advisory costs, staffing costs, or infrastructure spend.
Does an MGA B2B Licensee Pay “Compliance Contribution”?
A common confusion in the industry is mixing B2C “compliance contribution” with B2B licensing. The MGA’s explains that Compliance Contribution is payable on qualifying activities determined by reference to gaming revenue generated from gaming services (Types 1–4).
In other words, compliance contribution is primarily framed around gaming services revenue, which is typically B2C activity. If you are purely B2B critical supply and not offering gaming services to players, your main MGA costs are normally the application fee and the annual licence fee structure applicable to B2B, plus the costs associated with audits and ongoing compliance. The moment you add B2C activity, the compliance contribution rules become a central budgeting item, so your licensing scope must remain consistent with your business model.
The MGA B2B Licence Application Process
The MGA’s application process guidance note is one of the most useful documents you can read before you start. It explains how the MGA assesses each applicant. The MGA checks whether the applicant is fit and proper and whether it has a viable business strategy. It also checks statutory requirements and operational capacity. Finally, it verifies that the applicant implemented what it applied for on the technical environment before going live.
Applicants submit the application electronically through the MGA’s portal. The Authority advises applicants to consult the System Documentation Checklist before they initiate a new application.
A key practical point is completeness. The MGA places incomplete applications in a one-time “Incomplete” mode for sixty days. If you do not resubmit the missing elements within that period, the MGA rejects and closes the application.
This matters because many applicants underestimate how document-heavy an MGA B2B application can be, especially where the applicant has complex ownership, cross-border personnel, or a layered technical stack.
Fit and Proper Review for B2B Applicants
For B2B licensing, the MGA runs a fitness and propriety test on each applicant. It assesses information related to shareholders, UBOs, key persons, and overall business viability. The guidance note also states the MGA conducts probity investigations with other national and international regulatory bodies.
From an execution perspective, this phase often causes timelines to stretch. The MGA does more than review declarations. It also verifies consistency across corporate, financial, and operational information. If your corporate story changes during the application, the MGA may treat it as a “major change.” The guidance note explains that major changes before approval require a new licence application. Examples include changes affecting more than 75% equity ownership, control, or funding. They also include changes that require a new business plan and revised financial projections.
Funding Review and Source of Wealth in a B2B Application
The MGA also conducts a funding review. It assesses the source of funds used for gaming operations and the source and extent of wealth of UBOs. The Authority explains the difference between source of wealth and source of funds. It confirms that UBOs are fiscally stable enough to sustain the licence throughout its life cycle. It also verifies the legitimacy of funding sources.
For B2B suppliers, this is a critical phase because many B2B businesses are venture-backed or group-funded. Your funding narrative must align with your projected runway, operational plan, and your technical deployment commitments, especially because the process moves into system readiness after application review milestones.
Business Plan and Operating Policies Review
The MGA’s guidance note is explicit that it conducts a detailed analysis of proposed business operations, viability, funding, and an in-depth financial analysis of forecast financials. It expects a detailed forecast inclusive of marketing and distribution strategies and growth targets, and it examines incorporation documents and operating policies and procedures in line with the System Documentation Checklist.
For B2B applicants, this is where you win or lose credibility. A strong B2B application explains precisely what you supply, how you manage integrity risks, how you onboard B2C licensees or customers, how you manage third-party dependencies, how you patch and update software, and how you ensure auditability and regulatory record retention.
Technical Set-Up Review and External System Audit
The technical phase is a defining feature of an MGA application. The MGA explains that it reviews the technical documentation of the gaming and control system. Once it completes the review, it instructs the applicant to implement the systems on a technical environment in preparation for going live. The applicant is allowed 60 days to complete this operation.
Within those 60 days, the applicant may request an external system audit. An independent third party from the MGA’s pre-approved list performs the audit. The system audit reviews the staged environment against the policies and procedures the applicant submitted. The MGA uses a system audit checklist to define what the auditor must test during system review.
This is why an MGA B2B licence is viewed as premium. The regulator expects the live or staged environment to reflect what you described on paper. Inconsistency here is one of the most common causes of delay, because remediation often means rewriting documentation, retesting controls, and re-auditing.
Licence Outcome and Duration
Once the MGA completes the application review, it issues a gaming licence valid for 10 years.
That ten-year duration is significant for B2B suppliers because it supports long-term commercial contracting with B2C operators, platform partners, and institutional counterparties. However, “ten years” is not a promise of uninterrupted operation. Continuous compliance, reporting, and the ability to remain financially sound under the capital policy remain essential expectations.
MGA B2B Timeframes: What You Can Plan For
Timeframes are the most asked question, and they must be approached carefully. The MGA provides some explicit timing anchors, while other parts of the timeline depend on application quality and the complexity of the review.
The MGA makes it clear that it places incomplete applications into a one-time incomplete state for 60 days. If the applicant does not resubmit correctly within that period, the MGA rejects the application.
The MGA also provides a clear timeline for the technical deployment phase, stating that after successful technical documentation review, the applicant is allowed 60 days to implement systems onto a technical environment and trigger the external system audit.
Beyond these fixed windows, the overall time to licence depends on several factors. These include the speed of fit and proper checks and source of funds verification. They also include business plan evaluation, the completeness of your policies, and the readiness of your technical environment. Industry practitioners often describe the desk-based review and wider process as taking months rather than weeks. Timelines extend further when the MGA requests clarifications or amendments. As one professional-services overview notes, desk-based audit phases have historically taken around 12–16 weeks when submissions are valid and consistent. When submissions are not valid or consistent, timelines often extend.
A sensible operational plan for an MGA B2B application is to treat the process as a staged project where success is driven by readiness, not by hope. If you are already built, documented, and staffed, you can move faster. If you are still designing your platform, rewriting policies, or finalising ownership and funding arrangements, you should expect longer.
What Documents You Should Expect to Provide
The MGA repeatedly points applicants to the System Documentation Checklist before applying, because the application is documentation-heavy and depends on the licence type.
While the precise list varies depending on scope, a typical MGA B2B application will involve corporate documents, personal declarations for UBOs/directors/key persons, detailed business plan and financial projections, AML and governance policies, technical architecture documentation, security and access controls, incident management procedures, change management and release processes, data retention and audit trail design, and outsourced function oversight where applicable.
The reason the MGA is strict here is straightforward. A B2B supplier can sit at the centre of a large operator ecosystem. If the supplier’s platform, RNG implementation, or control system is not stable and auditable, the risk propagates to every operator relying on it.
Structuring Your MGA B2B Licence Correctly
One of the fastest ways to create delays is scope ambiguity. The MGA groups verticals into Gaming Types and expects approvals where relevant.
For B2B applicants, the cleanest approach is to define your scope precisely, match your policies to that scope, match your technical implementation to those policies, and ensure your third-party system audit can verify all critical elements.
If you supply multiple product lines, you should avoid the temptation to include everything in the first application unless you can demonstrate readiness for each line. Many suppliers succeed faster by licensing a stable, clearly bounded product scope first, then applying for additions once their baseline compliance and audit posture is mature.
The Real Cost of “Obtaining the Licence” Beyond MGA Fees
Even though the MGA’s official fees are clear, most applicants underestimate the total cost of licensing because they focus only on the €5,000 application fee and the annual licence fee bands.
A realistic budget must also account for the external system audit cost, legal and regulatory advisory support, the internal compliance workload, the need for a quality management approach to documentation, and the engineering work required to ensure your staged environment matches the description provided to the regulator.
This is why MGA B2B licensing is best treated as a product maturity milestone. If your platform is still evolving rapidly without stable change control, you are likely to face repeated questions during technical review and a harder system audit process.
Common Reasons MGA B2B Applications Stall
Most delays fall into a few predictable categories. Applications stall when ownership and funding narratives are incomplete, because the MGA has a defined funding review and requires legitimacy and sustainability.
They also stall when business plans are generic or inconsistent with the technical reality, because the MGA performs an in-depth analysis of operations and forecast financials and expects detailed strategy and growth targets.
Finally, technical delays often occur when the staged environment is not audit-ready within the MGA’s 60-day implementation window. Delays also occur when the system audit reveals gaps between documented procedures and system behaviour.
FAQ
What is an MGA B2B gaming licence?
An MGA B2B gaming licence is the Critical Gaming Supply Licence, which authorises a business to provide or carry out critical gaming supplies for the iGaming sector under Malta’s regulatory framework.
What is the MGA application fee for a B2B licence?
The MGA charges a one-time, non-refundable €5,000 application fee for gaming licence applications.
What are the annual MGA licence fees for B2B critical gaming supply?
The MGA’s official guidance sets annual licence fees by revenue: €25,000 if annual revenue does not exceed €5,000,000, €30,000 if revenue exceeds €5,000,000 but does not exceed €10,000,000, and €35,000 if revenue exceeds €10,000,000.
Is there a different fee for B2B back-office providers?
Yes. The MGA guidance lists an annual licence fee of €3,000 where annual revenue does not exceed €1,000,000, and €5,000 where annual revenue exceeds €1,000,000 for B2B back-office.
What is the minimum share capital for an MGA B2B licence?
The MGA requires €40,000 minimum issued and paid-up share capital for the Critical Gaming Supply Licence, and it also confirms this in its Capital Requirements Policy.
How long does an MGA B2B licence application take?
The MGA provides fixed timing anchors such as a 60-day window to remedy incomplete applications and a 60-day window to implement the technical environment and trigger the external system audit. In practice, overall timelines depend heavily on application quality and audit readiness, and desk-based review phases are often described by practitioners as taking several months when submissions are consistent.
How long is an MGA licence valid?
The MGA states that once approved, the gaming licence issued is valid for 10 years.
Conclusion: How to Win an MGA B2B Licence Faster and Cleaner
Obtaining an MGA B2B gaming licence is fundamentally about proving maturity. The fees are clear and predictable, with a €5,000 application fee and annual B2B licence fees that scale based on revenue bands, including specific structures for back-office and Type 4-only suppliers.
The timeframes are manageable when you understand the MGA’s process architecture. You must submit a complete application, pass fit and proper and funding review, present a viable business plan with credible financials, and then deliver an audit-ready technical environment within the 60-day implementation window before going live.
If you treat licensing as a disciplined project, with stable documentation and a system that can be independently audited, Malta remains one of the most valuable B2B regulatory approvals in the global iGaming supply chain.