Sky Bet makes Italy debut with Super 6 launch
Operator unveils Italian version of popular free-to-play product as real-money launch nears
Sky Betting & Gaming (SB&G) has made its Italian debut with the launch of its popular Super 6 product, marking the operator’s first venture outside of the UK market.
The Leeds-headquartered firm unveiled an Italian version of its popular free-to-play game over the weekend, enabling customers to win 100,000 for correctly predicting the scores of six Serie A games.
The game is open to over 18s only, who can sign up via Facebook, Twitter or Gmail, and features a weekly 2,000 prize if no player guesses all the correct results.
“Super 6 had a good first weekend in Italy and we are confident customers will enjoy it as much as they do in the UK,” a spokesperson told EGR this morning.
The product has been a successful customer acquisition tool for Sky Bet in the UK with the F2P game displaying how much customers would win should they place an accumulator bet using the match results from their score predictions.
And a launch of the real-money Sky Bet brand is expected to follow shortly, although EGR understands it will initially be made available to a select group of customers ahead of a full roll-out before the end of the year.
Preparation for SB&G’s move into the Italy online gambling market has been ongoing for a number of years now after operator originally applied for a licence from local regulator AAMS in 2012.
The firm has previously highlighted the strength of the Sky Italia brand â owned by SB&G’s former majority stakeholder Sky â as a key reason for SB&G targeting Italy as its first international market.
Last year, the company hired former managing director of Paddy Power Italia, Giovanna D’Esposito, to spearhead its new Sky Bet Italia business after opening new offices in Sheffield and Rome to aid the launch.
According to research firm Eilers & Krejcik Gaming, the regulated Italian online gambling market recorded 820.9m in revenue in 2015, with PokerStars, bet365 and Lottomatica estimated to have the largest market share.