Tom Waterhouse named William Hill Australia CEO
New chief executive will have responsibility for all three William Hill Australia brands following departure of former CEO Michael Sullivan
William Hill has today (Wednesday) announced the appointment of Tom Waterhouse as the company’s new Australia chief executive officer, replacing former boss Michael Sullivan who left in May.
Waterhouse will now assume responsibility for the UK-based bookmaker’s three Australian businesses which consists of Sportingbet, Centrebet and tomwaterhouse.com.
William Hill, who acquired tomwaterhouse.com last August for an initial fee of AU$35m (£20.5m) plus an earn-out of up to AU$70m, also said the earn-out has been settled early for a payment of AU$5m (£2.8m) in cash.
“Settling the earn-out ahead of schedule further improves William Hill Australia’s operational and fiscal flexibility following the successful systems integration of tomwaterhouse.com into William Hill Australia in April 2014,” the company said in a statement.
Tom Waterhouse himself remained as managing director of the brand following the acquisition and became a member of William Hill’s Australian management team, originally reporting to Michael Sullivan.
Sullivan became chief executive of William Hill Australia at the time of its purchase of Sportingbet last year and was replaced on an interim basis by James Henderson who recently became William Hill CEO designate earlier this month.
In William Hill’s Q1 financial statement the bookmaker described Australia as its “second home” and Ralph Topping said its Australian business was an important avenue for growth in the future after recording £86.7m in net revenue and £12m in profit during 2013.