Prophet Exchange strengthens workforce with three key hires ahead of New Jersey launch

New Jersey-based peer-to-peer sports betting operator Prophet Exchange has strengthened its product and content teams with three new hires ahead of its launch later this year.

The operator aims to become the first US sports betting operator to enable peer-to-peer betting, with its New Jersey launch planned for this summer via a market access agreement with Caesars Entertainment.

Today (31 May), the firm announced it has hired former Caesars senior software engineer Matt Stolarz as director of technical product, software engineer Zhifeng Shi as director of software engineering, and former Action Network social media exec Casey Halpern as director of social media and content.

Prophet Exchange director of technical product, Matt Stolarz: “You couldn’t dream up a better product or a better team to come into.”

Prophet’s new director of technical product Matt Stolarz has worked as a senior software engineer at both Caesars Entertainment and William Hill, where he and his team were responsible for launching the William Hill sportsbook in New Jersey and expanding it across the US.

“I am beyond excited to join Prophet Exchange to help guide and build the first and best sports betting exchange product in the United States,” Stolarz said.

“I am also looking forward to working alongside a brilliant and talented team of fellow sports betting industry experts. You couldn’t dream up a better product or a better team to come into.”

Newly appointed director of software engineering Zhifeng Shi previously built large scale data ingestion pipelines to provide business insights into near real-time data for companies.

Prophet Exchange director of software engineering, Zhifeng Shi: “I am very excited to have the opportunity to join Prophet to work with the product and engineering teams and to build the most reliable and trustable platforms to power the next revolution in US sports betting.”

Most recently, Shi was a software engineer at real estate broker Compass, which he joined in its early stages to build an end-to-end transaction management platform. The platform now powers more than 6% of annual US real estate transactions since its initial release under a year ago.

“I am very excited to have the opportunity to join Prophet to work with the product and engineering teams and to build the most reliable and trustable platforms to power the next revolution in US sports betting,” Shi said.

“I am looking forward to being a part of Prophet’s challenging and exciting journeys ahead.”

Prophet’s new director of social media and content, Casey Halpern, joins from his most recent role managing and overseeing social media channels at Better Collective-owned Action Network.

Prophet Exchange director of social media and content, Casey Halpern: “I firmly believe that Prophet Exchange will solve a plethora of problems that everyday sports bettors currently face.”

Prior to that, Halpern worked as a producer and researcher for NBC’s Football Night in America for the past five NFL seasons, in addition to a long history working with athletes and media personalities on producing social media content and building their profiles.

“I am thrilled to join Prophet Exchange,” Halpern said. “This is an incredible opportunity to help scale an important and innovative product that will be the first of its kind in the US.

“I firmly believe that Prophet Exchange will solve a plethora of problems that everyday sports bettors currently face. I am looking forward to the exciting, yet challenging times ahead as we build a best-in-class sports betting exchange.”

Read the article on iGaming Next by Conor Mulheir