Novibet strengthens executive team with dual appointment

Sports betting operator Novibet has appointed two senior figures to its C-suite and confirmed its board of directors lineup.

Christoforos Bozatzidis joins as CMO after a five-year spell at Athens-based sports telecommunications company Wind Hellas where he began as marketing development officer before becoming MD in June 2020.

Before his role at Wind, he spent just over seven years at mobile telecommunications business Cosmote. Prior to that, he was at the retail firm Germanos for just over two years. Bozatzidis will report directly to Novibet CEO George Athanasopoulos.

Meanwhile, Thomas Granite, who is currently Artemis Strategic Investment Corp’s CFO, will become Novibet CFO, treasurer and secretary following the completion of the SPAC merger, which will see Novibet listed on the Nasdaq.

Granite will oversee all financial aspects of the business, including investor relations, treasury, and capital markets functions. He will also take a more prominent role in strategic planning, business development and M&A.

Before joining Artemis, Granite was CFO at US-based Maverick Gaming between 2019 and 2020. Proceeding this, he was MD of the real estate, gaming and lodging investment banking group at Jefferies Financial Group for nine years.

On the appointments, Athanasopoulos said: “Christoforos has many years of senior management experience from the highly competitive mobile telecom industry, an industry that shares a lot of similarities with igaming and online sports betting in regards to customer acquisition, experience, and retention as our customers are constantly mobile, and we use the same KPIs for our data-driven decision making.

“Granite is an excellent choice to lead our finance team and will play an important role in driving our strategic development initiatives. Novibet’s senior management team, alongside all of our team members, will be focused on the collaborative innovation we know will help us grow and succeed.”

This news comes as Novibet confirmed its SPAC merger with Artemis should be concluded by the end of H2 2022.

Ahead of the deal’s completion, Novibet has stated that major shareholder Rodolfo Odoni, owner of the Komisium fund, will take up the position of executive chairman.

Odoni will lead the board, which will include Athanasopoulos as CEO, as well as Philip Kaplan and Holly Gagnon from Artemis.

Novibet also stated that Samy David, managing partner of private equity fund Grifton Partners, will serve as an independent board member.

Odoni commented: “Our proposed board of directors will be world-class, as it will include senior executives who possess significant gaming and technology industry and capital markets experience that we believe will prove valuable in helping the company continue to execute at a high level and achieve consistent progress on its growth initiatives.

“We’re looking forward to working collaboratively with George and the entire Novibet team as they embark on this exciting time in the company’s history and work to create value for all shareholders.”

The SPAC merger was first announced at the end of March, as Novibet agreed to a $625m deal with Artemis.

The news of the merger came shortly after the operator’s exit from the UK market and the surrender of its licence in February.