Mobile growth canât halt bwin.party profit slump
Mobile GGR more than doubles to â¬67.4m following product overhaul but group profits still slide 24%
Bwin.partyâs gross gaming revenue (GGR) from mobile products more than doubled in H1 2014 but the firmâs growth in the channel was unable to prevent a 24% slide in total group profits.
Mobile GGR soared 125% in the six-month period ended 30 June 2014 to â¬67.4m on the back of impressive growth from the operatorâs mobile sports betting and bingo products.
Boosted by the World Cup and new product launches during the period, bwin.party derived 35% of its total sportsbook GGR from mobile devices in H1, up from the 21% figure it recorded in the corresponding period a year ago.
Bwin.party chief executive Norbert Teufelberger attributed the increase to a new mobile sportsbook product that had been well received following its debut launch in Spain, and led to the operator deriving more than half of total sportsbook GGR in the country from mobile devices in June.
The operator also attracted more than 80% of its total UK sportsbook GGR from mobile devices that month and the company said it hoped to capitalise on the increase with the roll-out of additional features in the coming weeks.
Bingo also reported a strong mobile performance with 24% of GGR from the vertical derived from mobile devices, up from the 4% figure recorded a year ago. The firm said its new Foxy Bingo iOS application produced âvery encouragingâ results.
Poker and casino could not replicate the performance of sports betting and bingo as, despite posting marginal gains, GGR derived from mobile devices remained less than 10% for both verticals.
Meanwhile Teufelberger revealed the operator hopes to instigate growth in its mobile casino products through the adoption of more mobile casino titles. A further tranche of games is set to be integrated in the coming weeks, while new iOS and Android apps for the firmâs PartyCasino brand are also due to be released soon.
The firm also provided insight into its mobile marketing efforts during the period and revealed it had launched 224 iOS and 227 Android campaigns in six countries, resulting in 12.3 million customer contacts and 200,000 customer actions.