Thursday, Jan. 6
Tsunami Relief -- Various I-gaming companies from around the globe are chipping in to offer aid to those affected by last week's Indian Ocean tsunami disaster.
Sportsbook.com, the flagship brand of Sportingbet, has partnered with Northwest Medical Teams International and is encouraging its customers to help those in need by matching 100 percent of all customer donations. . . . Britain's National Lottery has pledged £12 million toward a three-year program to help rebuild communities and restore local infrastructure. . . . AbsolutePoker.com will donate all tournament fees from this Saturday's activity to the International Red Cross. The company expects this amount to reach $25,000. Last night AbsolutePoker hosted a special Tsunami Tourney, the proceeds of which will also benefit an aid fund... Next Generation Entertainment and Winward Casino Group, two separately owned gaming companies, joined together to pledge 100 percent of revenue from all of their Web sites on January 5 to the International Red Cross. The Web sites, which include WinwardCasino.com, WorldwideVegas.com, Bingohall.com, BingoPalace.com, OnlineBingo.com and Vicsbingo.com... Bryan Bailey of Casinomeister.com and Ted Loh of Got2bet.com are holding auctions for one-year ownership of prominent advertising space on top of both Web sites' main index pages, and the entire sum of the winning bid will be donated to UNICEF to help flood victims. Bidding opens at $20,000 and closes in one week.
IGH and IEN -- Interactive Gaming Holdings, which through its subsidiary, Interactive Entertainment Network (IEN), operates over 1,000 Web-based properties in over 30 countries, says it has just signed two major online gaming operators as paid advertisers through IEN. The company derives its revenue from the sale of advertising to third-party operators based upon a cost-per-click model. It says current click-through rates for the recently introduced contextual advertising are between 20 to 30 percent with conversion rates between 5 to 8 percent. The company's statement does not include the names of the two operators.
betinternet.com -- Isle of Man-based betinternet.com stated that high attributable overhead costs will cause it to post an interim operating loss when it publishes it results for the half-year ended Nov. 28 in three weeks, despite considerable improvement by its sports book division and turnover from its pari-mutuel activities. The company also claims it will benefit from the Isle of Man's new policy change that permits the acceptance of bets from U.S. customers, and it announced that it will again begin offering wagers on horse racing at major U.S. tracks. The company's Play Live Casino product brought in more than $1.1 million in turnover in its first two weeks of operation, and another new product, Play Football, is said to be off to an encouraging start.
Slot Reviews -- Online casino portal CasinoMan.Net has launched a new section of its Web site that provides detailed information, reviews and screenshots of 250 online slot games. Information such as jackpot size, reels, pay lines, coin sizes and other features are given to help players find games that are to the their liking and right for their budgets. The site also boasts a search-and-compare engine that lets users compare up to five slot games next to each other.
Wednesday, Jan. 5
Bodog Bowl -- Costa Rica-based sports book Bodog.com says it has sent invitations to the two undefeated Division 1 college football teams in the United States--Auburn University and USC--as well as to the NCAA Athletic Committee, offering to pledge $50 million toward a "Bodog Bowl" game between the two teams to declare an undisputed national champion. Each school would receive a $15 million scholarship fund, and the winning team's school would win an additional $15 million scholarship fund. A final $5 million would be allocated to the NCAA Minority Opportunities and Interests Committee. The offer is very unlikely to be taken seriously, considering the NCAA's outspoken opposition to betting on college games as well as betting among student athletes.
CES Expansion -- British betting exchange and skill games software provider CES Software has signed a deal to acquire Nevada-based Corcom Inc. and assets of its Don Best Sports business, whose Web site (donbest.com) publishes exclusive, real-time wagering odds. The company, which reported a loss of $250,000 for the nine months ended Sept. 30, 2004, does not offer wagering, but it publishes a wide range of market-sensitive wagering information, live odds, line move alerts, alert messages, injury reports, statistical reports, line seekers and bet trackers on its customizable Web site. The acquisition, arranged through Toronto-based Celeus Capital Corp. (part of JJR Capital Partners), includes payment of $40 million in cash, the issuance of 1 million CES shares on completion and the issuance of up to 1 million additional shares based on earnings performance. Corcom had agreed to sell Don Best to Celeus last August, and JJR later approached CES with the opportunity to purchase the business. As part of an agreement, CES will deliver 2.24 million ordinary shares to JJR Capital Partners and will reimburse Celeus for $1 million.
Nigeria's Lottery -- News reports in Nigeria indicate that a company called Fortune Games Limited is launching a mobile lottery in the country this week. Subscribers to Nigeria's four mobile phone networks--MTN, Econet, V/Mobile and Global Comm.--will be able to participate in the weekly draw by selecting six numbers between 1 and 49 and sending them via SMS to the lottery's server. Rather than launching a terminal-based lottery that would suffer from the occasional loss of power experienced by Nigeria's infrastructure, Fortune Games opted to launch a mobile lottery, which would be immune to power failures. Ten percent of the company's gross earnings will be allocated to the development of Nigeria's tertiary, secondary and primary education.
SportsDirect Growth -- SportsDirect Inc., publisher of sports content site Covers.com, has acquired Denver, Colorado-based sports contest and office pools site Wagerline.com for $1.2 million. The site will continue to operate as a separate property, but management and operations will be transferred to SportsDirect's headquarters in Halifax, Canada. SportsDirect says the acquisition is part of the overall continual growth it is seeking. In the last two years the company has doubled its workforce to 80 employees and opened offices in Galway, Ireland and Las Vegas, Nevada.
Offline Promotions -- U.K.-based ThinkBingo.com has announced plans to launch what it calls the first offline advertising campaign for an online bingo site. Created by Mercier Gray and bought by Target NMI, ThinkBingo's print campaign will target female gamblers. The site, which has a player base of over 8,000, enables members to play games from as little as 10p.
Tuesday, Jan. 4
Cantor Fined -- England's Financial Services Authority fined spread betting firm Cantor Index £70,000 last week for running a misleading ad campaign. The FSA ruled that Cantor's posters, flyers and press ads did not contain adequate warnings to inform punters of the risk of financial loss they could face. Of particular concern to the FSA was a promotion started in September that involved handing out flyers at London Underground stations, offering free mobile phones and personal organizers with spread betting capabilities to anyone who registered an account with Cantor. The FSA said the risk warnings on the promotional material were not clear enough and there was no guarantee that consumers understood that they could lose substantially more than their original deposits.
Z4P Back Office -- Multi-platform I-gaming software developer Zone4Play announced the first deployment of its cross-platform back-office solution for betting operators. "ZoneMAS" (Management Application Suite) enables the delivery of betting services on Internet, mobile and iTV platforms using a one-time registration process and a single account. It also includes marketing and advertising tools, including a bonus system mechanism, tournament systems, data mining and an in-house affiliation system. The first deployment of ZoneMAS occurred on New Year's Day on the Winner channel, a new U.K.-based fixed-odds service that will soon be launched on the NTL and Telewest Broadband digital cable platforms. Zone4Play has provided Winner a complete end-to-end technology solution, including the ZoneMAS system, gaming engines and front-end development.
Nalmafene -- California-based Somaxon Pharmaceuticals will begin a late-stage Phase 3 human study next year of the drug nalmafene to see whether it can be used to treat gambling addictions. Nalmafene, which is used to reverse the effects of anesthesia, is looked upon as a possible gambling addiction treatment because it is thought to inhibit some of the mechanisms that are involved in impulse disorders. In November, Somaxon paid $13.2 million to a Finnish drug company, Biotie Therapies, for the right to develop and sell nalmafene in the United States as a treatment for pathological gambling and other impulse-control disorders. Although some psychiatrists prescribe anti-depressants to addicts with mixed success, there is currently no clinically approved drug to treat pathological gambling.
Magna Deals -- Churchill Downs Inc. and Magna Entertainment Corp. announced an international simulcast distribution agreement that will deliver the two operators' racing products to the European market. Racing content from 18 of the companies' North American operations will be combined and presented for export through Magna's Austrian subsidiary, MEC Sport und Entertainment GmbH, to outlets in Great Britain, Ireland, Austria and Germany. The partnership will bring coverage at top U.S. racetracks to the European market. Participating tracks include Churchill Downs, Fair Grounds Race Course, Gulfstream Park, Hollywood Park, Lone Star Park, the Maryland Jockey Club and Santa Anita Park. . . . Meanwhile, Magna has ended the restriction of its racetrack signals from outside account wagering providers by forming new content agreements with AmericaTab and Youbet.com. In December 2003, Magna removed its signals from all Internet wagering sites except for its XpressBet platform. The new content deals allow both AmericaTab and Youbet to provide their customers wagering and simulcast presentations of racing from Magna's racecourses.
Phoenix Interests -- Online Enterprises, a subsidiary of Phoenix Interests, has launched online account wagering on its two new thoroughbred portal sites Web sites, Barn66.com and BetBarn66.com. Oregon-licensed wagering hub AmericaTab will handle all account wagering activity for the sites, and Online Enterprises will receive a fee for each wager placed. Customers of BetBarn66 and Barn66 will be able to wager on races at tracks owned by Magna Entertainment Corp, thanks to the recent deal struck between AmericaTab and Magna. Phoenix Interests has also launched a new corporate Web site at www.phoenixinterests.com.
WorldMatch -- Awcom Inc., the Las Vegas company that runs the AssociatedPlayers.com portal, became the first company to launch a licensed online casino gaming site in the European Union when it partnered with Malta-based I-gaming software and solutions provider WorldMatch. The site, EUVegas.com, offers non-download games for fun or real-money play in English, Spanish and Italian. . . . Italian soccer club Torino Calcio has enlisted the aid of WorldMatch in launching a ToroGaming.com entertainment site that provides games, promotions and other opportunities to win official team merchandise and tickets. Similar sites are already in use by all the major British soccer teams, but Torino Calcio is the first Italian team to launch games.
Turkish SportXction -- ISWI (Interactive Systems Worldwide Inc.) subsidiary Global Interactive Gaming Limited and Sportingbet have expanded their agreement and incorporated the SportXction play-by-play sports betting service into Sportingbet's Turkish wagering site Superbahis.com. As on other Sportingbet sites, SportXction provides wagering on soccer, tennis, golf, cricket, rugby and snooker.
Welcome Aboard -- William Hill has appointed David Edmonds as a non-executive director to the company. Edmonds has previous experience as director general of telecommunications at Oftel and as managing director of Group Central Services at the National Westminster Group. He is currently chairman of NHS Direct and holds several non-executive roles in both the public and private sectors.
Mobile China Lotto -- South Korea-based Internet service provider Solvix Technology has announced plans to set up a mobile lottery service in China. The company says it will set up joint ventures with content providers this month and later in the year will launch the lottery and a ring-tone service. Solvix enables subscribers of South Korea's SK Telecom to purchase lottery, toto and horse racing tickets via online payments.