Elys Game Technology Corp (NASDAQ:ELYS) (NEO:ELYS) (FRA:3UW) announced that it has entered into a definitive purchase agreement to acquire Bookmakers Company US LLC, a Nevada-based sports betting company doing business under the name US Bookmaking (USB).
Founded in 2016, USB provides sports wagering services such as design and consulting, turn-key sports wagering solutions and risk management. In exchange for a 100% interest, Elys will pay $12 million, half in cash and half in common shares. USB members will also have the chance to receive up to an additional $38 million, plus a potential 10 premium if certain milestones are hit over the next four years, the company said. The transaction is expected to close on July 15.
USB’s management team includes well-known sportsbook operator Victor Salerno as president, who has more than 40 years experience in the Nevada sportsbook business managing risk for over 100 properties. He was inducted into the American Gaming Association's Gaming Hall of Fame in 2015 and SBC's Hall of Fame in 2020.
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The company’s CEO is Bob Kocienski, who also brings four decades of gaming industry experience, including oversight of the sportsbooks at several high-profile casinos. Its director of bookmaking, Robert Walker, has more than 30 years of experience managing sportsbooks at casinos, including the Stardust, Mirage and the MGM. John Salerno, Victor’s son, is director of operations and compliance. He brings some 20-plus years of experience in the sports wagering industry working under his father, the company said.
“We started US Bookmaking with a vision to build a top-ranked team of experienced bookmakers in light of the looming repeal of sports betting prohibition in the US,” Victor Salerno said in a statement. “Since 2018, our team and customer network have been building quickly and we are very optimistic about the expansion and growth opportunities developing in the US sports betting market.”
In 2018, the US Supreme Court struck down the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PAPSA), a federal law that had prevented states from regulating sports betting, except those that had already done so. After the law was repealed, USB expanded in New Mexico and later into Colorado, Michigan and Washington DC
Elys’ sports betting technology is a perfect fit for its US operations, Salerno said.
“We realized that to effectively compete and grow with this opportunity we needed a viable technology partner that knows the sports betting business extremely well,” he continued. “Having visited the Elys trading floor in Italy, we are very impressed with the work that the Elys team did to Americanize their sports betting technology. We believe the timing of this acquisition is ideal for USB since we have been vetting the technology field for the best sports betting technology while getting ready for the reopening of our clients as the COVID pandemic subsides. The addition of a proprietary sports betting platform will allow USB to customize features that our clients desire while having full control of our cost structure.”
Elys’ technology provides operators with an innovative platform that can be used for sports wagering, virtual games, lottery and casino games. It delivers both B2B (business to business) and B2C (business to consumer) bet processing and is capable of managing tens of thousands of pre-match events and more than 200 live events.
“Our team at Elys has worked diligently to prepare our leading-edge platform for the booming opportunity in the US market,” Elys Executive Chairman Michele Ciavarella said. “Our focus has been to ensure that our future US clients are able to access a design-built solution for sports betting in the US that is locally supported with comprehensive trading, risk management, operations and maintenance teams for frictionless deployments.”
“We are extremely pleased with the relationship that we developed with the founders and highly-experienced team at USB during our negotiations and the extensive synergies that we believe the combined entities have. We found great commonality between the family culture that Elys fosters in its Italian operations, as with USB and its business operations spanning a number of states in the US. We believe that our Elys Gameboard technology will give USB the tools they need to rapidly expand their current US footprint and potentially develop operations in the evolving Canadian sports betting market.”
Contact Andrew Kessel at andrew.kessel@proactiveinvestors.com
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