Mybet mobile stakes quadruple despite online fall-back

German gaming operator mybet has reported a quadrupling of its mobile betting stakes for the 2015 financial year, marking a bright spot in an otherwise disappointing set of results.

Mobile stakes reached ?20.2m, up from ?5.2m in 2014, driven by the “steady development and expansion of the mobile offering, as well as by the growing take-up of mobile sports betting, especially live betting”.

Late last year, mybet moved to upgrade its mobile casino offering through a partnership with NYX, which saw the operator launch more than 150 mobile games.

However, the mobile success was not matched across the rest of the online betting business, with total stakes falling from ?100.6m in 2014 to ?95.1m this year.

The dip came despite average betting stakes per active customer improving 20% to ?435, suggesting a drop off in the number of active customers. By contrast, the firm’s retails business saw betting stakes improve by 8.7% to ?93.5m, leading to an overall increase in combined stakes of 1%.

The sports betting vertical made up 54% of the firm’s total revenue, which itself fell 1% to ?69.2m, leading to a negative EBIT for the year of ?8.8m.

However mybet was optimistic about its future, thanks to an updated IT platform, which cost more than ?5m to implement in 2015.

“With the help of the new, higher-performance IT platform, the aim is now to market [sports betting and casino] more efficiently and thus to secure further rises in the betting stakes placed by both existing and new customers in the future,” the firm said in a statement.

The final part of the new backend will be completed in the second quarter of 2016, and mybet said the improved product offering and optimised core processes would help generate revenue growth of between eight and 12% for the 2016 financial year, with a positive EBIT.

“We were confronted with an array of challenges in the past financial year,” Zeno Ossk?, Mybet chief executive, said.

“But the development especially in our core area of sports betting confirms our strategic direction. The rise in betting stakes even in the absence of a major sporting event demonstrates that our omnichannel strategy is bearing fruit.

“We now enable our customers to use all mybet sales channels using one central betting account. For a further boost to customer loyalty, we have also specifically transferred measures from the online sector to retail business.

“Satisfied customers are our top priority, and in conjunction with a high-performance IT platform are the basis for sustained growth in revenue and profit over the coming years,” he added.

The firm said it would publish its full, in-depth 2015 numbers on 12 April.