EGR Power 50 2024: 10-6

Proudly sponsored by

10: Betsson

Financials: H1 2024 revenue amounted to €519.7m – a 13% increase on H1 2023 – while EBITDA rose 22% YoY to €149.2m, giving an EBITDA margin of 28.7%

Strategy & impact: Very much a casino-centric operator; 75% of revenue comes from gaming – its portfolio of local hero brands has been built over the years through organic growth and strategic M&A 

Geographic reach: Holds local licences in 22 countries, although more than 40% of revenue is from non-locally regulated markets. CEECA is the largest segment based on revenue share

Influence & leadership: Built from a legacy business in Sweden, it is now one of the largest online groups. Growth, management insists, should be generated in a profitable and sustainable manner

“The best quarter ever for Betsson.” That was CEO Pontus Lindwall hailing the operator’s performance for the three months to the end of June, as new internal records were set for revenue and operating income. 

The Swede singing the company’s praises and pointing to new highs for various KPIs has become a routine occurrence during quarterly earnings presentations, such has been Betsson’s momentum of late. This winning streak is reflected in the Stockholm-listed firm’s share price, at the time of writing, climbing 75% over the past two years.

Boasting a stable of more than 20 brands – including Betsson, Betsafe, Rizk and NordicBet – this is an operator continuing to make inroads into the region classed as CEECA (Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia).

Within this segment, Croatia, Lithuania and Estonia have stood out of late. CEECA now accounts for 42% of group revenue, followed by Latam (25%), the Nordics (16%) and Western Europe (16%).

Betsson has historically been perfectly content to plant its flag in unregulated markets, which has tended to have a bearing to some degree on the operator’s final position in the rankings.

However, share of revenue from locally regulated jurisdictions was 58% in Q3 (€163m) – up from 45% for the same period in 2023. Meanwhile, Q2 (55%) included Peru for the first time as local gaming tax was accrued during the entire period. 

Furthermore, local licences for this newly regulated market were secured for Betsson, Betsafe and domestic operator Inkabet in the summer. The push into Latam is aided by a four-year front-of-shirt deal (Betsson.sport) struck in July with Italy’s Inter Milan, a club with strong ties to South America thanks to its current and former players.

In March, Betsson secured its re-entry into the Dutch market with the acquisition of a locally licensed B2C business and a B2B outfit for a total consideration of €27.5m. Staying with M&A, Betsson acquired Sporting Solutions’ trading, pricing and sports betting risk-management services from FDJ in August. The purchase will partly be used to enhance the B2C offering.

Further M&A activity could be on the cards with the news in September that Betsson would gauge investor appetite for a €100m bond offering. The proceeds would be used to refinance existing bonds and fund acquisitions.

9: Kindred Group

Financials: GGR for the first half of the year was £635.3m, an increase of 3.5% YoY, although this included B2B (3% of revenue). Underlying EBITDA (including B2B) leapt 26.5% to £132.9m 

Strategy & impact: Comprising nine brands, this long-established and well-run business had reached a stage in its lifecycle where some sort of M&A was inevitable. In the end, FDJ came knocking 

Geographic reach: Western Europe (65%) and the Nordics (23%) account for nearly 90% of revenue. As a result of the FDJ deal, Kindred Group will exit markets with “no clear path to regulation”

Influence & leadership: Remains a significant brand in the sector. Kindred is one of the most transparent firms regarding RG with its ‘Journey towards zero’ stats (share of revenue from harmful play)

This is Kindred Group’s swan song as a separate entity in the EGR Power 50 now that French giant La Française des Jeux (FDJ) completed its €2.5bn acquisition of the legacy Swedish operator.

One of the top five betting and gaming operators in Western Europe, with a presence in seven of the leading European markets, Kindred Group has made steady progress in 2024.

That’s despite it feeling as if the business has been locked in a holding pattern since FDJ launched its public tender offer in January, a few weeks before Nils Andén was appointed Kindred Group’s permanent CEO.

Operationally, Unibet’s parent company reported a “strong performance” in its locally regulated markets for the three months to the end of March, mainly driven by the Netherlands, the UK and Romania. Active customers across the group increased 3% to 1.7 million.

This momentum continued into Q2, as active players climbed 12% and core markets of France and Belgium returned to growth. Also, Euro 2024 led to its highest revenue ever generated on a football tournament (£183.6m) – up 16% on the 2022 World Cup.

Elsewhere, work on releasing the internally built Kindred Sportsbook Platform (KSP) continues apace; the new product has been tentatively rolled out in “several smaller” test markets. Early results are positive and development milestone targets are being met, management has revealed.

One region that won’t be receiving the KSP is North America after the company’s withdrawal from the region was completed by the end of Q2. It means Kindred Group has reverted to being largely a pan-European operator, with Western Europe accounting for approximately two-thirds of group revenue.

Surveying the outlook ahead for FDJ’s new asset, there are regulatory storm clouds brewing in certain core markets, though. For instance, the Netherlands is raising tax on GGR from 30.5% to an unpalatable 37.8% in two phases between now and 2026.

Teun Struycken, the Dutch minister responsible for gambling, has said he’s considering curbs on “very risky elements” of slots, along with a blanket advertising ban.

Perversely, a ban could turn out to be beneficial to Unibet given its gold medal position and brand awareness in the country.

8: Kaizen Gaming

Financials: Information shared with BDO reveals this business experienced substantial YoY gains in NGR and monthly active players for the trailing

12 months to 30 June 2024

Strategy & impact: To have its logos plastered across club shirts, leagues and competitions. Moreover, the marketing blitz is backed up by stellar products powered by proprietary technologies 

Geographic reach: Has a presence in 18 markets globally, including podium positions; Betano has become one of the world’s most recognised sportsbooks

Influence & leadership: Still run by founder and  CEO George Daskalakis, Kaizen Gaming has ballooned into one of the world’s leading online gambling businesses in little more than a decade after being established

Bursting into the top 10, Kaizen Gaming’s inexorable ascent within the industry has been nigh on impossible to miss. Formed in 2012, this business first established itself in its home market of Greece with Stoiximan, before going on to launch a brand that management firmly believed could conquer international markets: Betano.

Today, Betano is responsible for the lion’s share of Kaizen Gaming’s 13 million active customers, while the group is present in 18 markets, including Portugal, Romania, Czechia and Germany. Betano also has a strong foothold in Latam, particularly Brazil.

On Brazil specifically, the bookmaker has experienced explosive growth in a few short years to become the widely recognised clear market leader. This is supported by data from web traffic tracking firm Semrush showing there were more than 82 million visits to Betano.com from Brazil in October – around 40 million more than the nearest competitor. It’s not a bad position to be in when a nation of more than 200 million people is on the verge of transitioning to a regulated online gambling market.

When speaking to EGR in September, the CEO of one established operator in Brazil referred to Betano as the industry’s “North Star”, such has been its impact.

Elsewhere, Betano entered the UK market in May via a white-label deal with BVGroup, with the launch supported by a two-year front-of-shirt deal with a resurgent Aston Villa. Football sponsorships are certainly part of Kaizen Gaming’s DNA; the operator has deals with an array of clubs, including Olympiacos, Panathinaikos and PAOK FC, that compete in Greece’s top-flight, the Brasileirão Betano and Torneo Betano, as well as Portugal’s most successful teams, Benfica, Porto and Sporting CP.

What’s more, in September, Betano became the official global sponsor of the UEFA Europa League and UEFA Conference League. As part of the three-year deal, Stoiximan is both competitions’ sponsor in Greece and Cyprus. If that wasn’t enough, Betano was the official global sponsor of Euro 2024. The prestige and TV exposure attached to this high-profile deal was a real feather in the company’s cap.

To round off an impressive 12 months, Kaizen Gaming topped seven categories at the EGR Operator Awards (see page 44), including the headline category, operator of the year. So, that ascent shows little sign of running out of power anytime soon.

7: Evoke

Financials: H1 2024 group revenue was £862m, a fall of 2% YoY. Adjusted EBITDA slumped 26% to £115.5m, including UK&I online and International (26% and 24%, respectively)

Strategy & impact: A business comprising the long-established online operator 888 and 90-year-old heritage bookmaker William Hill, the latter of which benefits from its omnichannel offering

Geographic reach: Its five ‘core’ markets are the UK, Italy, Spain, Denmark and Romania. So-called ‘optimise markets’, or those with potential to become core, include Sweden, Germany and Ireland

Influence & leadership: Blessed with considerable brand recognition, although that only gets you so far. The C-suite has undergone a radical shake-up; nine out of 11 roles are new since October 2023

The parent company of William Hill, 888 and Mr Green has a different corporate identity to 2023’s edition of the EGR Power 50, as evoke was unveiled in May as the new name for this multinational group, supplanting 888 Holdings.

By bringing the various components of the business under a single unifying brand, the makeover was trumpeted as the beginning of “evoke’s exciting future”. It’s the present that’s the priority, though, with CEO Per Widerström freely admitting throughout the year that the operator was underperforming.

As part of evoke’s reset, the Swede and his new-look leadership team spearheaded a value creation plan (VCP), while a cost optimisation programme looked to deliver £30m in savings.

Even so, H1 2024’s performance made for uncomfortable reading;

UK&I online revenue was back to growth, albeit a modest 1%, and International revenue increased 2% in cc, yet UK&I online EBITDA plunged 26%.

A £16m YoY jump in marketing spend and being frivolous with free bets were partly to blame. The normally phlegmatic Widerström said forcefully on the earnings call: “These results are disappointing and are not acceptable.”

The upshot is there’s now a more rigorous approach to marketing ROI, investment in automation and AI, and a greater focus on “core mid-value” customers. Improvements have been made to product and customer lifecycle management, while evoke has vowed to be disciplined with the allocation of capital to deleverage the business. The corrective action taken means H2 revenue growth is projected to be 5%-9%.

Geographically, the company has abandoned its B2C ambitions in the US. Instead, evoke is doubling down on its ‘core’ markets of the UK, Italy, Spain and Denmark, which accounted for 78% of group online revenue in 2023.

Romania is now a fifth core market, following the announcement in August that evoke was to take a majority stake in local operator Winner.ro, with the combined business becoming the country’s fourth-largest operator (about 7% market share). This low-capital, high-impact acquisition is from the same playbook as evoke’s 19.9% position taken in its African JV, 888AFRICA. Closer to home, in August, William Hill inked a record-breaking deal with the Scottish Professional Football League.

6: Super Group

Financials: NGR for the first half of 2024 rose 10.4% to €794m; adjusted EBITDA (excluding the US) amounted to €167m, an increase of 18.5% YoY 

Strategy & impact: Although Betway may hog the limelight, Spin’s panoply of websites has helped make this a gaming-centric operation; nearly 80% of group net revenue is down to online casino 

Geographic reach: At 39% of Q3 net revenue, Africa (live in seven markets) is the largest segment, followed by the Americas (36%). Europe and RoW accounted for 17% and 8% of net revenue, respectively

Influence & leadership: Continues to be one of the most prolific bookmakers around when it comes to high-profile sports sponsorships, therefore boosting Betway’s brand recognition

Holding on to sixth place, this New York-listed operator has honed a divergent strategy for online sports betting and casino efforts over the years.

On the one hand, Betway is the sole sports betting brand embedded in regulated and grey markets across Europe, Africa and the Americas, yet a multi-brand offering is the modus operandi with igaming.

Until recently, its igaming brands – which fall under the Spin umbrella – weren’t so well known, besides flagship site Jackpot City. It was all a bit opaque. Now, though, the dozen or so casino and bingo brands are clearly displayed as tiles on its new snazzy corporate website.

As for sports betting, there was noteworthy news in May when it was announced Super Group was shelling out €140m to purchase the sports betting technology licensed by its long-standing software partner, Apricot.

Earnout payments will also be made if certain conditions are subsequently met, namely Super Group will hand over up to €210m to Apricot’s licensor if sportsbook revenue more than doubles during the earnout period to the end of 2035.

Super Group’s leadership said the transaction brought the company “closer to its goal of owning and controlling its sportsbook technology across its worldwide markets”.

It was also noted the deal would “enable maximum flexibility” for organic growth and M&A opportunities. Never one to miss a commercial tie-up opportunity to put eyeballs on Betway, the bookmaker became the official global partner of Premier League champions Manchester City in July.

Similar deals followed with Nottingham Forest and Chelsea, complementing existing partnerships with Arsenal, Brighton & Hove Albion and its long-standing front-of-shirt sponsorship of West Ham United.

Much like other international operators that tried and failed to crack the US, Super Group was forced to cut its losses. In July, it was announced the Betway sportsbook would be yanked from the nine states where it was live. The decision, management said, came after an extensive internal review concluded there was no real prospect of a path to profitability.

That said, Super Group decided to continue to offer online casino in New Jersey and Pennsylvania with two brands within the Spin portfolio, including Jackpot City. Sportsbook shutdown costs came in at around €36m, the operator disclosed in its Q3 earnings update.

If you are lucky enough to be ranked a Power 50 operator, secure your place at the Power 50 Summit next April.