People news 29 May 2014
The latest people news from the egaming industry in the last seven days (23 May to 29 May 2014)
BetVictor acquired by Michael Tabor in restructure
Victor Chandler and CEO Michael Carlton to step down as part of a company restructure
British gambling and horseracing millionaire Michael Tabor has acquired BetVictor in its entirity for undisclosed sum with founder and current chairman Victor Chandler stepping down as part of the changes.
In a complete restructure of BetVictor, CEO Michael Carlton will also be stepping down, and alongside Chandler will work with the company as a consultant.
The changes have received in principle regulatory approval from the Gibraltar Gambling Licensing Authority under whose licence BetVictor operates.
“Having owned and led this business for more than 40 years, I looked towards the future and I decided that the company would be best served under new ownership and leadership,” Chandler said in a statement.
PokerStars CMO departs in reshuffle
PokerStars head of customer relationship management Morten Tonneson has been promoted to group marketing director as part of a major marketing reshuffle at Rational Group that sees the departure of current CMO Alex Payne.
Vadim Soloveitchik becomes PokerStars’ director of marketing, and he, along with Tonneson, will report directly into Rational Group COO Rafi Ashlenazi.
Sarne Lightman has become Full Tilt Poker director of marketing, and will report into Full Tilt’s managing director Dominic Mansour, who joined the company in March.
Seven days in people news:
Stan James launches trader redundancy round
Stan James has placed 10% of its trading team at risk of redundancy as the operator attempts to keep pace with an “increasingly competitive online betting industry”, eGaming Review has learned.
As many as 11 Gibraltar-based sportsbook traders could be set to leave the firm as part of a programme designed to improve the scale of Stan James’ pre-event and in-running markets.
According to the firm, the programme has seen a greater emphasis placed on “state of the art technology” with the move resulting in the need to restructure parts of its trading operation.
Playtech COO switches roles in company restructure
Playtech chief operating officer Shay Segev has been appointed chief executive of the Group’s retail subsidiary Videobet as the software supplier undergoes a wider company restructure.
According to the Group, the redeployment of Segev is part of an increased focus on the development of its retail arm.
“I am delighted to lead Playtech’s retail arm through its next strategic phase of combining our retail and online offering,” Segev, who joined Playtech as COO of Videobet in 2006 before being appointed Playtech COO in 2011, said.
Bwin.party strikes compromise agreement with Ader
Bwin.party’s verbal wranglings with activist investor Jason Ader appear to have come to an end as the two parties struck an agreement to work together on appointing the operator’s new directors.
The deal sees one of Ader’s board nominations, Daniel Silvers, take a place on bwin.party’s board and as a result his SpringOwl investment firm has withdrawn its four resolutions that were scheduled to be put to shareholders at today’s AGM.
Ader made the directorial nominations after he acquired a 5.25% stake earlier this year and has been critical of bwin.party’s board, claiming poor strategic decision making has caused the firm’s share price to fall in recent years.
Novomatic Group subsidiary Greentube has announced Gernot Baumgartner has been internally promoted to take up the role of head of marketing and sales.
Baumgartner joined Greentube in September 2010 as a key account manager and will now lead the company’s strategic and operational developments in the B2B sector.
“I believe that our professional structure will help us to extend Greentube´s leadership position in terms of current Cross-Platform Gaming solutions,” Baumgartner said.
“One of our biggest goals is a continuous broadening of business partnerships in international markets with dynamic environments,” he added.