BetOnSports Strategy -- David Carruthers, CEO of Costa Rica-based betting company BetOnSports, said he's extremely pleased with his company's mid July $101 million float on the London Stock Exchange's Alternative Investment Market. He said the company is "particularly delighted with the quality and quantity of institutional investors who are now shareholders in BetOnSports." He also revealed that BetOnSports plans to open its very first land-based betting shops in the Central and South American regions during the fourth quarter of 2004. The company would like to open 1,000 shops within the next three years. They'd also like to enter new markets by acquiring Internet gambling brands in Asia, Australia and Europe.
WTO Delay -- Representatives from Antigua and Barbuda and the United States on Aug. 16 requested that the World Trade Organization's dispute panel continue the suspension of panel proceedings between the countries for another 28 working days. The parties now have until Oct. 4 to negotiate a compromise. It's second agreement to delay proceedings; the first occurred July 1.
Mobile Scratch -- Finnish digital gaming solutions provider EGET (European Game & Entertainment Technology) has rolled out what is billed as the first ever mobile scratch-card games. The group the week delivered its first two mobile lottery scratch cards to Sperospel.se, the Swedish national gaming operator. Any customer with a mobile phone equipped with MMS (multimedia messaging service) capability can order a scratch card by sending an SMS message a premium number. Users can also schedule tickets to be delivered on a regular basis. The two mobile scratch games, "Femman" and "Sperolotten," have already been available for some time at the Sperospel.se Web site.
Refinancing Bourse -- Betting exchange Punt2punt.com has ceased operating due to a lack of financial backing. Parent company The Gaming Bourse stated in May that it hoped to raise £5 million by floating on the Alternative Investments Market, but announced at the end of June that it had abandoned those plans. According to the company's marketing director, David Parker, "The company is currently going through a second phase (of) refinancing and (restructuring). We only soft launched the site and never hard-launched it, and we had not gone head-to-head with Betfair by introducing racing on the site; it was mainly financial markets, football and tennis with racing part of phase two."
Welcome Aboard -- The Association of British Bookmakers has appointed Russ Phillips as its new deputy chief executive. For the last four years Phillips has served as a principal case officer for the Office of Fair Trading, where he compiled the 200-page Rule 14 notice published in April 2003 and explained the U.K. government's conclusions after an investigation into racing.
Quoteworthy -- "I'm certain there are thousands more people out there like me. It's so easy to play and because you're not dealing with cash; it never feels like you're losing thousands."
- Eileen D'Arcy, a 37-year old Scottish mother of four whose story was featured in the Sunday Mail. D'Arcy reportedly lost £50,000 over the course of 18 months by playing Internet fruit machines.