Sport Buff adds former Ladbrokes and FEG exec as partner

Sport Buff has secured former Fortuna Entertainment Group (FEG) group chief operating officer Nicklas Zajdel as a partner and investor.

Zajdel joins the gamification and on-screen engagement company after an eight-month break in his career following his departure from FEG in May 2022.

His arrival at the firm comes after Sport Buff secured $2.5m (£2.05m) in seed funding in August 2022 and had a successful World Cup.

Sport Buff was founded in 2019 by Ben Achilleas and Jonty Whitehead and currently has a partnership with partypoker across the brand’s Twitch streaming channels.

Zajdel was FEG’s chief operating officer for three years, joining the Czech Republic-based firm in October 2019.

Before his time at FEG, he served as the chief digital officer at the Intralot and spent five years at Ladbrokes Coral across a number of positions, including MD of digital and omni-channel director.

Zajdel also spent time at Playtech as the supplier’s VP of business operations.

On his new role, Zajdel said: “I’m thrilled to join Sport Buff as a partner and an investor. I share their vision of being the global leaders in engagement and activation for digital broadcast and live streaming, and that belief is backed with my own investment.

“Starting straight away, I look forward to working closely with founders Ben and Jonty, the board of Buff and the whole team, adding my experience from the betting and gaming sector and contributing to product evolution, revenue generation and operational excellence,” he added.

Whitehead commented: “We’ve known Nick for a number of years, and it’s exciting that we’ll now be working with him inside Buff as a partner in our leadership team and as an investor, helping to drive the next stage of our growth.

“He’s taken a keen, long-term interest in the development of our products, followed our journey and clearly likes what he’s seen. We also love what he can bring to this rapidly growing business.”