By Daiva Repečkaitė and Julian Bonnici
- Documents link Vigen Badalyan, an Armenian with Maltese citizenship, to VBETTR, and its numerous iterations – illegal gambling sites blacklisted in Türkiye
- Illegal VBETTR websites carry partnerships with the Maltese Premier League and the Malta National Football team
- Records and a first-hand account suggest Badalyan & his SoftConstruct provided services to the illegal gambling network of Halil Falyalı, a Turkish Cypriot businessman murdered in 2022.
Vigen Badalyan, an Armenian with Maltese citizenship, was named “leader of the year” for his “visionary strategies” at SiGMA Europe 2024 in Malta, a government-endorsed conference which carried the logo of Badalyan’s BetConstruct on every participant’s badge. However, an investigation by an international media consortium has shown that Badalyan’s interests allegedly extend to lucrative illegal gambling markets, notably in Türkiye.
Documents obtained by OCCRP, Amphora Media and other media partners have uncovered that Vigen Badalyan was behind vbettr.com and its numerous iterations – illegal gambling sites blacklisted in Türkiye. This website family is a Turkish twin of Badalyan’s Vbet brand. Vbet has partnered with the Maltese Premier League and the Malta National Football team, and this is displayed on the Türkiye-targeting website as well.
SoftConstruct’s legal team said, “Vbettr.com is not owned, managed, or operated by SoftConstruct or Vigen Badalyan”. However, they did not reply to our request for clarification when provided with website registrations, which showed the contrary.
According to a former head of finance of slain alleged illegal gambling tycoon Halil Falyalı, Badalyan’s companies allegedly provide betting infrastructure to Falyalı’s illicit network.
The investigation team verified website registration data to find that SoftConstruct Limited is listed as the internet service provider for at least four websites blacklisted in Türkiye that were registered by Ibrahim Tokkan.
Tokkan was indicted in 2024 as an alleged manager of the illegal betting network of Halil Falyalı and worked for companies belonging to the Falyalı family. He denies the charges.
Read more about Halil Falyalı global betting empire in this story by our publishing partners, OCCRP
And our story exploring the alleged network’s operations in Malta
The legal team of SoftConstruct denied the claims, saying, “We categorically reject any suggestion of involvement in unlawful activities or associations with criminal organizations. As a B2B [business-to-business] technology provider, SoftConstruct supplies gaming software solutions, but it does not operate or control third-party businesses that use its products.”
The Badalyan’s ties to Malta and VBETTR’s operations
Vigen Badalyan and his brother, Vahe, are known for founding Soft Construct, which owns the BetConstruct brand. Data from 2021 shows that in Malta, they were the declared beneficial owners of Vivaro (now SCGO) and Soft Construct (Malta), as well as owners of FastShift Ltd. and V Venture Ltd.
The brothers and members of their families have become naturalised Maltese citizens through the citizenship-by-investment scheme.
In a corporate network that spans continents, Soft Construct and BetConstruct offer products and services targeting businesses (so-called B2B products), while Vbet targets gamblers directly.
Vbet websites are owned by corresponding national branches or the Maltese branch, which targets several EU countries and the UK. Badalyan companies use similar brands across jurisdictions.
Their Maltese companies, either owned directly or via the Isle of Man, are registered at the same address in Portomaso and have, over time, shared the same directors.
Yet there is one website, and its many spelling variations, which, despite similar branding, is not immediately recognisable as part of the Vbet family and does not appear to be run by the same people.
VbetTR, with its numerous iterations, does not appear on the official whitelist of licensed gambling operators in Türkiye. On the contrary, different numbered variations of VbetTR are found on the country’s blacklist.
Still, websites targeting gamblers in Türkiye have carried the familiar Vbet logo and display the Badalyan company’s partnerships with European football clubs.
The website targeting Türkiye is listed on a licence issued by Curacao – as a recent investigation by Follow the Money shows, Curacao is a go-to jurisdiction for gambling operators in the grey area. While they obtain some form of licence, they do not operate with one that covers the jurisdiction of their target players. In this case, being a licensed gambling provider in Curacao -or Malta- does not entitle a provider to offer gambling in Türkiye.
Historical domain data for the vbettr.com website reveals that in 2019, the registrant’s name was listed as “Badalyan Vigen”, and the associated email address was team.webmaster@betconstruct.com.
In response to reporters’ questions, SoftConstruct’s legal team said, “Vbettr.com is not owned, managed, or operated by SoftConstruct or Vigen Badalyan. To the best of our knowledge, the website in question [vbettr] was not registered using the email address team.webmaster@betconstruct.com. We have no record of this email being used for such a registration, and we are not aware of any connection between our systems and this domain.”
Badalyan’s AI chatbot on BetConstruct’s website provided a different answer.
Asked if his companies offer betting services in Türkiye, Badalyan’s chatbot said, “Yes, some of the companies co-founded by Vigen Badalyan, such as Vbet, offer betting services in Turkey. However, it’s important to check the specific regulations and availability of services in the region, as they can vary. If you need more detailed information, please let me know!”
Amphora Media requested clarification on the discrepancies between SoftConstruct’s replies and the documents found by reporters showing Vigen Badalyan’s involvement. However, no replies were forthcoming.
The director of IT Management Santora B.V., VbetTR’s Curacao licence holder, is Yeva Asiryan, who actively promotes BetConstruct on her Facebook account and, in some documents, appears as Yevgenya Asiryan. ‘Asiryan Yevgenya’ is also the registrant contact name on BetConstruct’s Canadian website. BetConstruct expanded into Canada in early 2025.
In response to questions sent in 2021 by our publishing partner, Hetq, a representative of Soft Construct CJSC denied knowingly participating in illegal gambling in Türkiye, saying that the company merely provides technology to various gambling operators globally, including those that target “the Turkish-speaking clients scattered around the world”.
Read Hetq’s story here.
Badalyan companies have faced regulatory action before
This is not the first time the brothers’ businesses are subject to regulatory action. In 2020, the Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit in Malta issued Malta-based Vivaro Ltd a €733,160 fine, but it was challenged and revoked on constitutional grounds. There are two pending court cases involving Vivaro, one in the constitutional court.
In response to reporters’ questions, the Malta Gaming Authority (MGA) said, “The MGA collaborates with a wide range of international stakeholders to ensure that the gaming sector is not misused for money laundering or other criminal purposes. Therefore, when you reference Vivaro (now SCGO) and the fines that were issued by the FIAU, we would like to note that these were a direct result of a full-scope examination conducted by the MGA, where we identified a number of shortcomings. The FIAU subsequently imposed an administrative fine of €733,160 and a Follow-up Directive. The sanctions issued by the FIAU are currently pending court proceedings.”
In 2021, Swedish gambling authorities wanted to suspend the Malta-based Vivaro Ltd’s gambling licence over failing to commence operations within a year from registration. Vivaro Ltd responded in its statement that during the period June 2020 – May 2021 it had no turnover in Sweden and that 50 staff members were drafted into the Armenian army.
In the financial statement from January to December 2021, submitted to the Malta Business Registry, Vivaro reported receiving income from Sweden and having five employees in Malta. Still, Sweden’s Administrative Court reversed the decision of the gambling authorities to suspend its licences for commercial online gaming and betting and issued a warning, according to the Swedish Gambling Authority”.
In the UK, failings were found in Vivaro’s, since renamed SCGO’s, processes for money laundering prevention and safer gambling, but in 2023, SCGO reached a settlement with the UK Gambling Commission and agreed to pay £337,631.
In Romania, vbet.com found itself blacklisted by authorities in 2018 for operating without a licence. But in 2024, BetConstruct announced obtaining a licence to provide B2C betting (that is, targeting customers directly) in Romania. As the original Vbet website remains blocked, the company launched with the “Victory Bet” domain, registered by the Malta-based V Venture.
Meanwhile, Vigen Badalyan continues touring gaming events around the world, attending exclusive interviews, and collecting new gambling licences for his companies.
SiGMA did not respond to questions sent.
Amphora Media collaborated with the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), Times of Malta, Public Record (Romania), Follow the Money (Netherlands), Hetq (Armenia), Investigative Reporting Lab Macedonia, Belarusian Investigative Center and Shteg.org (Albania) on the research for this investigation.
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