Internet Power For Paddy

Published: Friday, September 02, 2005 Online-Casinos.com

INTERNET POWER FOR PADDY

Online revenues overtake land income

Online gambling as a viable complementary business for sports betting houses received a ringing endorsement this week with the news that Irish and UK bookmaker Paddy Power had generated most of its current profits away from its high street betting shops for the first time.

The group said its non-retail businesses accounted for 63 percent of operating profits of Euro 17.8 million in the six months to June 30, compared with one-third of the Euro 18.2 million earned last year. The online portion increased by 62.5 percent to a healthy Euro 175.2 million in revenues.

Paddy Power launched online poker operations during the period, enjoying strong growth over summer. The group has 74,000 customers on its Internet gambling database, with two-thirds in the UK, and operates an online casino as well as telephone betting.

Paddy Power's Director of Finance, Ross Ivers declared, "We are now reaping the rewards of our strategy of investing upfront in our start-up businesses with our online channel now generating record earnings and set for continued expansion."

Company PR spokesmen said that the growth in non-retail businesses helped to shield Paddy Power from the impact of a poor run of results in the big horse races in the first six months of this year when many of the favourites romped home.