Businessman André Feldman (50), CEO of BIG Brazil, and his wife, Juliana Alves Feldman, died in a helicopter crash on the night of this Thursday (16) in a dense forest area in Caieiras, in the metropolitan region of São Paulo. Feldman had been working in the gaming industry since 2002. He was the organizer of WSOP Brazil, representative of the Caesars Group for nine years, with which his company obtained the official license to operate betting in the country, co-founder and president of ANJL.
The aircraft had taken off from Campo de Marte Airport, in the north zone of the city, bound for Americana (SP). GMB, as well as the entire industry, mourns the loss of an executive who had a long history in the sector.
André Feldman was responsible for bringing one of the world's most important casino groups, Caesars, to Brazil, and was CEO of BIG Brazil, which represents the American conglomerate in the country.
Since 2012 he had been leading the group's business and thanks to him, the company obtained its license to operate sports betting and online games, first in Rio de Janeiro, and from the beginning of this year, with national authorization.
Feldman was also one of the pioneers in the dissemination of poker in Brazil, by working directly with lovers of the mind sport through the world's main tournament, the WSOP (World Series of Poker).
The tragedy left two survivors, the couple's daughter, a 12-year-old girl, and the pilot, who were rescued alive. The pilot activated the security forces, who began the search on the morning of this Friday (17). The aircraft's signal was lost around 8:34 PM on Thursday (16).
The accident occurred in a hard-to-reach area, in the region of Morro do Tico-Tico, and the aircraft was only located on the morning of this Friday (17), around 6:15 AM. The disappearance had been recorded at 11:28 PM the previous night.
Feldman had been working in the gaming industry since 2002. He served as a consultant for four international groups, with Caesars for nine years, and a role as an event organizer for WSOP Brazil since 2015.
Over the last decade, he had been supporting from Brasília the regulation of various game variants in the country.
Having a strong core business in regulatory matters, working in technology companies, André had his first contact with the gambling market in 1996 with the opening of bingos in Brazil, but only in 2002 did he really start to act more effectively in this sector.
In 2010, he began his relationship with the Las Vegas casino network, Caesars, dedicating himself entirely to this sector, and in 2015, already working with Caesars as a consultant in the area of regulation, was when he began to think about poker.
The businessman also started the WSOP (World Series of Poker) in the year 2015. When he acquired the brand's license for Brazil, his first idea was to move from the theoretical field and experiment in practice what it was like to be a game operator in Brazil, at that time when poker was still not so recognized by the authorities and still suffered prejudices and many difficulties in the regulatory issue mainly to get the 'permit' the operating licenses.
“The first WSOP in Rio was a case of adrenaline. Many believed it would not be possible. I confess that sometimes even I doubted whether we would be able to hold the event. We made history, we retold history, we marked an era. Approximately 70 years those halls built in 1927 had not received players, dealers, tables, and chips. It was historic, especially for me, who fight for the regulation of the sector. That was a dream, an honor, and an achievement,” said André, a pioneer of the sector.
In 2023, Feldman was one of the founders of the National Association of Games and Lotteries (ANJL), in Brasília. The body aims to seek the effectiveness of the sector's projects and representatives of companies in the field in Brazil before the government and Congress. André himself was the first president of the entity.
Feldman's company, BIG Brazil, obtained last year the licensing of the Caesars Sportsbook brand, a division of Caesars Entertainment, to launch sports betting operations in the country. BIG Brazil already had a partnership with Caesars through the operation in Brazil of the World Series of Poker® (WSOP®) brand, the largest poker tournament in the world.
Subsequently, the consortium obtained the official license from the Ministry of Finance to operate legally in Brazil and launched the site caesarsports.com.br. His company also had a license from Loterj to work in Rio de Janeiro in a regulated manner.
Source: GMB
