Gaming Realms rules out Foxy Bingo move
CEO Patrick Southon says operator is focused on in-house products and is preparing to launch bingo product on flagship site Spin Genie
Gaming Realms will not mount a bid for Foxy Bingo owner Cashcade should prospective owner GVC Holdings decide to sell the bingo business, the operator’s chief executive Patrick Southon has told eGaming Review.
Cashcade was founded by Southon, Gaming Realms chairman Michael Buckley and executive director Simon Collins in 1999 and the trio grew the business to net annual revenues of £45m before selling the company to PartyGaming for £96m deal in 2009.
However, despite praising the strength of the Foxy Bingo brand, which operates on 888’s Dragonfish platform, Southon ruled out buying back the business should GVC decide to sell once its acquisition of bwin.party has been finalised.
“Foxy is a great brand and I think they’ve [bwin.party] done well to keep the revenues and profits since we’ve left,” Southon said.
“But we have no intention of making a bid as it’s on a third-party platform and we don’t think it would give us the flexibility to grow in the same way our in-house products do,” he added.
eGR understands a number of firms including 888, Rank Group, Intertain and Stride Gaming, would be interested in acquiring Cashcade, which last year posted revenues of 51.9m and clean EBITDA of 11.8m.
And Gaming Realms’ focus on in-house products comes as the operator prepares to launch a new bingo product on its flagship Spin Genie website as part of plans to scale its proprietary gaming platform.
The London-based firm, which last week reported a 48% sequential rise in Q3 revenues, has completed development of the bingo product which is currently awaiting UK compliance approval but is expected to go live within the next two weeks.
The new product was built using the AIM-listed operator’s in-house technology and will be available as a tab on SpinGenie.com once approval has been obtained.
“Bingo is a great game and it’s still an important part of the business and opens up another targeting layer for us to acquire players,” Southon said.
Gaming Realms currently operates the Iceland Bingo brand as well as a number of white label bingo skins on 888’s Dragonfish platform.