Boylesports CEO to leave after only five months
Lee Richardson to leave Irish bookmaker Boylesports for "family reasons". Founder and owner John Boyle takes over as acting CEO.
Lee Richardson, CEO of Ireland’s largest independent bookmaker will leave the company at the end of August after only five months in charge for “family reasons”, the firm has said. Founder, owner and managing director John Boyle will become acting CEO for the “foreseeable future”, Mark Nunan, head of marketing told EGRMagazine.com.
Former Chartwell Games chief executive Richardson joined in March this year succeeding previous Boyle Sports chief executive Daniel O’Mahoney who left the Irish bookmaker in April “for personal reasons” after five years in the position.
Richardson joined Boylesports just a year after he was re-appointed as chief executive at Canadian gaming software provider Chartwell Games, having previously left the post in 2007 after three years at the helm. His first stint at Chartwell ended because he was unwilling to relocate to Malta from the UK. Between leaving and re-joining Chartwell, Richardson is believed to have worked for Bodog Europe.
“Lee is leaving for his own personal reasons,” said Nunan. “His family is based in the UK and at this juncture in his career he believes it would be best for him to move back to the UK.”
Nunan added that founder and owner John Boyle had taken on an “increasingly hands-on role in recent times” and that he would take over as acting CEO for the foreseeable future.
“John is very passionate about the business and visits the retail stores and liases with the trading team on a daily basis. This is not a huge leap in terms of workload for him and is not a culture change,” Nunan said.
Boylesports’ head of marketing added that the company’s future plans would include attempting to “eat away” its competitors’ market share as well as hiring more staff and investing in technology.
In March this year Playtech signed a bingo licensing agreement with Boylesports less than a month after the software provider ramped up in the bingo space with the acquisition of Virtue Fusion.
Virtue Fusion is one of bingo’s most liquid networks, with peak traffic of more than 6,000 players, giving Boylesports access to unrivalled bingo prize pool liquidity. Playtech already provides Boylesports with poker.
In April Tombola replaced Boylesports as English Premier League football club Sunderland AFC’s shirt sponsors.