Entain’s investors call on Thursday featured lengthy presentations from CEO Jette Nygaard-Andersen, Chief Operating Officer Sandeep Tiku, and Managing Director Dominic Grounsell.
There also were six promotional videos, including one featuring a group of people — presumably bettors – chasing a red balloon, and numerous slides accenting areas of growth including online regulated markets and sports betting. The presentation also featured sloganeering phrases such as “awesome products,” “ambitious wide ranging innovation agenda,” and “intelligent technology” worthy of a multi-million-dollar ad campaign.
But actual financial details were scarce, most of them disseminated in a press release issued prior to the call. And the biggest news of the day, the acquisition of US-based esports betting group Unikrn, wasn’t mentioned until more than 30 minutes into the call.
Nygaard-Andersen said that acquisition opens up access to a “latent market in skills-based wagering, but also opportunities to cross into real money betting in other sports.
“It is a nascent and rapidly growing market, providing a huge opportunity,” Nygaard-Andersen said. “By 2025, we estimate the esports and skill-based wagering market will grow rapidly to be worth around 12 billion U.S. dollars.”
Among the areas of growth emphasized to investors and market analysts on the call was Entain’s standing in the US sports betting market through BetMGM, its joint venture with MGM Resorts. Nygaard-Andersen stated that the company captured 17% of the U.S. sports betting market in the second quarter of 2021.
“But if we strip out New Jersey and Pennsylvania, where we’re still building our position after joining the markets late, our market share is 22%, in line with our long-term objective of 20-25%,” Nygaard-Andersen said.
The CEO underscored that Entain’s presence in 27 countries, with an average market share between 13-15%, presents additional growth opportunities and provides a steady growth driver.
“We have now delivered 22 quarters of consecutive double digit online growth,” Nygaard-Andersen said. “… It puts us in a select group of high-growth companies, such as Netflix, Peloton, Door Dash, and other major digital operators.”
Nygaard-Andersen also mentioned Entain’s determination to only operate in regulated markets by the end of 2023.
“New markets are going through regulation all the time, and at an ever-faster pace with a five-fold increase in the markets that are regulated over the last 10 years,” Nygaard-Andersen said. “This provides us with potentially 50 new markets we can enter in the medium term, and that number is likely to rise.”
Nygaard-Anderson added that any new growth opportunities Entain will consider may be set up as separate verticals.
“The reason we’d do this is we’re bringing in entrepreneurs, so we really want to make sure we focus on different metrics there, which is about building the platform and so forth,” she said. “And then as the market matures and our products mature, we will look at that vertical just as we are looking at all our other verticals within the business, and they will be incentivized in the group around that.”
