Betsson takes "significant steps forward" on mobile

Betsson AB chief executive Magnus Silfverberg (pictured) believes his firm is making “significant steps forward” in mobile after last week’s Q3 results showed the operator to be making up ground on its market rivals.

Speaking to eGaming Review following the company’s results disclosure on Friday, Silfverberg said its improved mobile performance was one of the main factors behind the company’s organic growth rate of 16%.

“We had fantastic mobile delivery in Q3 and saw an increase of usage the in mobile channel with mobile’s share of revenues up to 23% from 17% last quarter,” Silfverberg said.

Betsson has been playing catch-up on mobile over the past few years after being left behind by many of its market rivals, however, a series of mobile improvements over the past 12-18 months has sought to rectify the situation.

And sportsbook was the standout performer with 40% of all sportsbook revenues coming through the channel in the period, which compared well to Ladbrokes H1 mobile sportsbook penetration of 43%.

“Sportsbook turnover was 40% and bear in mind we have only recently launched our brands on a strong mobile offering – growing from 30% in Q2 and 21% in Q1 – so these are significant steps forward,” Silfverberg said.

Silfverberg also confirmed the operator was to close its 85-strong sportsbook development office in the Philippines early next year and relocate the roles to its recently opened Malta headquarters.

According to Silfverberg, the move has so far cost the firm around £750,000 in restructuring costs and will see the development team placed alongside its sportsbook traders which should assist the product development process.

“It’s [Philippines office] not closed yet and will continue to operate until we make the full move in the next six months or so but we have taken the decision and thereby we incurred a one-off cost and that’s why we announced it today [Friday],” Silfverberg said.

“There will be room in the current office and the whole idea is to put our development of the sportsbook closer to the operations of the sportsbook to be able to be more flexible and adaptable in new developments,” he added.

Last week Betsson confirmed it had added to its B2C brands after purchasing Portugal-facing Dhoze.com for an undisclosed fee from a B2B partner following the end of its joint contract.

Silfverberg said the deal had been agreed before details of the soon-to-be liberalised Portuguese market were released and that the company would need to inspect the regulatory and tax frameworks before being able to commit to a licence application.

The operator is also still mulling whether it will press ahead with an application for a UK licence although welcomed recent regulatory news in Sweden where the country’s monopolised framework was referred to the European Court of Justice last week.