After the interview I’ve come away with the impression that the RAS value proposition is similar to that of AWS.

Among certain circles, AWS has described its customer value proposition as “undifferentiated heavy lifting”. Back around 2014, the pitch was essentially: why have technical engineers doing low-level stuff (installing and diagnosing hardware, installing and managing hypervisors, patching hardware and low-level software, etc.) when 1. None of this work differentiates your product or service from your competitors, and 2. AWS can do it better due to the scale it operates at? Instead, have your techies focus on application user experience and speed to market, because that’s the stuff that matters.

RAS’s value proposition sounds very similar for wagering companies. Why buy data from all the rights holders worldwide, process it, normalise it into a standard, make sure it’s working 24/7, and correct errors, when RAS can do it much better, do it for a large number of wagering companies, and amortise the cost across the entire customer base?

Managed Trading Services (MTS) is going to be interesting. Once RAS reaches a certain scale and is seeing a certain volume of betting flow, it’s going to be a service that is hard to beat. I’d imagine they’re already considerably better at managing trading for international races (UK, France, HK, etc.) than purely domestic wagering companies. Wagering companies will also need to decide how “differentiated” managing their own trading really is to the business - or whether time, focus and resources are better spent on customer acquisition, user experience, and proprietary bet types.

Another great chat in the bag @Strawman! (insert DJ Khaled gif) It was fantastic to dig deeper into what “data services” actually is, how sticky the products are, areas that could be considered competitive advantages, and also some potential network effects.

Being relatively familiar with the name, here are my key takeaways / reinforcements from the conversation:

• Racing authority software could evolve into a fourth pillar. This was mentioned during the annual results presentation and came up several times again today. At present, RAS provides software systems for the Greyhound Board of Great Britain (GBGB) and recently secured a win with the Mauritius Turf Club to bring racing back to the island nation.
• RAS is a technology company at its core. Stephen himself is from a technology background. The company has both the talent and expertise internally to build, iterate, and pursue new opportunities across the racing ecosystem. Every potential acquisition and partnership is viewed through the lens of “can we just build it ourselves?”
• Stephen is young, energetic, ambitious, and not running RAS in "business as usual" way. He’s constantly pursuing opportunities and taking calculated bets. You get the sense that if the appropriate opportunity comes across his plate, he won’t hesitate to take a big swing.

What a great interview @Strawman.

Enjoyed this one in particular, I’m interested in adding to my IRL and SM holding after today’s interview, as you said “Nothing like a bit of confirmation bias”.

Stephen was articulate in his discussions with you and I liked what I heard.

A fast growing, profitable, world leading Aussie Tech company, early in it’s journey with network effects and strong insider ownership, what’s not to like!

Thanks also to @Wini for sharing his knowledge and thoughts on Mereweather Capital’s Blog back in March 2025

Held IRL and on SM.

Great chat @Strawman, still working my way through it. Notes will follow, but here are the few lines around RTH's moat that I was looking for to lock in my bubbling conviction:

Have the largest database of racing data in the planet, not just raw data but curated, normalised and standardised data for global racing

• Can rate a horse that runs anywhere in the planet against any other horse that runs anywhere on the planet, in a format and consistency of quality that can be used to generate further products from
• Lots of complexity, data points and data acquisition to get this data
• Subscription-based, very sticky, long-standing, lifeline of bookmakers and platform providers - its how they get and keep their customers and how betting transactions are initiated
• Same with stock investing - use data to make betting decisions 
• Product is best in market globally - product that keeps customers, customers coming back

Was a bit impatient and opened a starter 0.68% IRL this morning at $0.96, position in SM is pending. As my conviction is now firmly in place, prefer to lock in a starter position, then average down/up along the way as the case may be. Not that easy to get reasonable selling volumes, so need to be patient to have orders filled, and have to accept that not all will be fulfilled at the pricfe that I am after.

Disc: Now Held IRL, Pending in SM