Harrahs Closes Brit Online Gambling Venture

Published: Friday, March 04, 2005 Online-Casinos.com

HARRAHS CLOSES THE DOOR ON BRIT ONLINE GAMBLING VENTURE

$9.3 million loss last year

Vegas gambling giant Harrah's Entertainment Inc. has reportedly halted operations at its UK Lucky Me.com online gambling site following losses of $9.3 million last year.

Introduced in November 2003 for British bettors the site was first suspended in October, Harrah's revealed in its annual report to shareholders this week. Spokesman David Strow said that the virtual doors of Lucky Me had been closed because it was losing money.

Lucky Me allowed players to access a wide range of games through a monthly subscription. Gamblers paid from about $17 to $84 per month for access to bingo and other games with cash prizes ranging from $8.50 to $1.7 million. The site featured a sophisticated identification process that prohibited bets from U.S. residents as well as from other countries where Internet gambling is prohibited.

Developed in partnership with Revahertz Networks, a Boston-based, privately-held software game developer that founded Gamesville, a games-for-prizes site that was sold to the Internet search engine Lycos in 1999, Harrah's had high hopes for the site.

The closure comes after Harrah's announcement in January that it would dissolve a partnership with Gala Group Ltd., to build casinos in Britain after the UK Parliament significantly restricted the number of casinos that can be built under the new gambling bill, which is now expected to allow only eight Las Vegas-style resort casinos. Going into the Gala deal, Harrah's and other U.S. operators were optimistic that more casinos would be permitted. But concerns about problem gambling and a proliferation of neighborhood casinos led to a more restrictive gambling bill than had been anticipated.

Strow said the gambling bill and legislative concerns didn't factor into the decision to abandon Lucky Me.