Online poker in the United States in general and Nevada in particular moves ever so close with every passing month. Nevada, as you know, was the first state to legalize online poker play since the Department of Justice in the United States passed that choice to the state level. The DOJ reversed a policy they had steadfastly insisted on sticking by for years, when in December of 2011 they ruled that Internet poker is a game of skill, and could be regulated on the state level. And on July 26 gaming hardware and software bigwig Shuffle Master received approval as only the third company behind Bally Technologies and International Game Technology as a full-fledged Internet poker dealer in Nevada.

Shuffle Master had entered a previous deal with undisclosed parameters with Bally Technologies, and there is no early word if there will be any online poker partnership involved now, and if this licensing will affect those plans or not. Shuffle Master can now offer their online poker technology in software and hardware form to Nevada casino companies thanks to the ruling from the state’s Gaming Commission. One of the Commission board members said that licenses for casinos would begin to be awarded this fall, and the business-to-business providers license given to Shuffle Master allows them to maintain games and run them on the behalf of casinos and resorts.

Shuffle Master is headquartered in Las Vegas and was founded in 1992, and aside from Internet gaming interests, they also specialize in automatic card shufflers, table games, slot machines and electronic table games systems which they sell and lease to casinos and resorts. With global interests in on and off-line casino gaming, their chief strategy officer Louis Castle stated that Shuffle Master’s next step is to enter partnerships with currently developed social media-based gaming operators to build a player database. (Zynga, get ready for a phone call.)

As Nevada inches closer and closer to the reality of online poker within their state boundaries, they stand poised to solidify their position as the United States leader in this brave new world of legalized online poker in America. No doubt the passage in Delaware of legalized online poker legislation is helping move things along rapidly in Nevada, and competition between those two states to be the first to virtually shuffle up and deal will in the end be a positive development for all of America’s online poker players.