The Million Dollar Dream
"It has always been my dream to make million dollars. Coming from a poor family, money seemed to be the salvation and the solution to all problems for everyone around me. I made it my goal to make a lot of money, and that motivated me in my studies - I fully embarked on studying mathematics and programming, participated in various programming competitions and went to university. And that's where I discovered poker in 2008."
Oleg Ostroumov, a native of Moscow lived an ordinary life at first. He went to high school, was interested in mathematics and computer science, and spent his free time playing computer games. In 2008, his classmates introduced him to poker, and the mathematical genius quickly found a liking for it. He gradually moved from friendly home games to online poker, where he worked his way up from $2 tournaments to $1,000 buy-ins in 18 months. As he progressed deeper into the mysteries of poker, he discovered the concept of the Nash Equilibrium - a concept developed by mathematicians John Nash and John von Neumann to describe a mathematically optimal (theoretically unbeatable) game strategy.
The more Oleg studied about it, the more he was determined to create an algorithm that would help a player calculate this optimal strategy. "As an avid programmer, I tried many times in high school to come up with algorithms that would help me achieve the Nash Equilibrium, but I was unsuccessful. It wasn't until 2013, after years of searching for information and 6 months of intensive programming, that I was able to develop a program optimized for heads-up play in No-Limit Hold'em."
The program originally started with a completely random strategy that gradually evolved as the program played against itself. Gradually, it became a tool that could greatly improve poker players' understanding of the game, and Oleg himself realized its incredible power. Out of academic research and months of writing algorithms, the first poker solver was born.
I've created a solver, now what?
At the time of this creation, Oleg was only 22 years old and had no sales or business experience. Instead of offering licenses for less money to the entire public, he decided to reach out to the best players in the world and give his product a premium price. At the time, there was only one similar product on the market, StoxEV (later CardrunnersEV), which handled only the most basic Nash Equilibrium scenarios and with the price of $50.
After careful consideration, Oleg decided to price his software somewhere between $50,000 - $100,000. And that's when Trueteller appeared on the scene. Poker pro Timofey Kuznetsov reached the highest online limits within 15 months and won over $2 million on PS alone. The agreements and negotiations between the two young men lasted almost 2 months, during which the distrust between the two parties, who did not know each other, was fully manifested (Trueteller was still hiding his own identity at the time).
Therefore, Oleg didn't put everything on one card and started approaching the top 20 heads-up players in the world, to whom he wanted to offer the program in the form of royalties for a 5-figure sum. However, the players' distrust and skepticism mostly brought only ignorance or even accusations of a scam. The only one who showed interest was Alex "Kanu7" Millar, who was even interested in an exclusive contract to use the program.
"Also these negotiations were incredibly drawn out and I wasn't working or playing poker during these months, I was dedicated to this full time. Money was running out fast and despite being broke I had to act confident and hold my price. Even though I only had enough money in my account for 2 months rent, I still insisted that I wanted at least $200,000 for my program."
A successful deal
In April 2013, patience paid off and Oleg signed a deal with a six-player consortium led by Alex Millar. He granted the players exclusive access to the program in exchange for $200,000 with a term of 18 months. Bolstered by this success, later that year Oleg was able to create a solver on Omaha, which he was later able to sell for $300,000. "Thanks to this project, I realized that my real passion is developing complex programs rather than playing poker itself." So after years of counting, writing code and negotiating, the young man took a half-step towards his first million. But he knew even then that this was just the beginning of something even bigger......
You can try Oleg's hold'em solver for free at https://holdem.olegsolvers.com/
Source: 2+2, Medium, Twitter (X), PokerNews
