Online gambling may be less than three decades old, but globally, it is among the highest revenue-generating ones. The niche was not considered a serious industry until the 1990s, when game developers and bookmarkers started venturing online. The industry consolidated itself, attracting investments in the millions.
Today, the betting sector is valued at $59.6 billion and is projected to reach $127.3 billion by 2027. Sports betting contributes to most of the revenue generated in the industry, followed by casinos, poker, and bingo, respectively.
Being a significant pillar of the entertainment industry makes it home to thousands of companies fighting for the attention of an ever-growing client list. The cut-throat niche has sunk many firms, but some have risen to become revered giants with services to cater to almost any gambler. Out of these many establishments, here are five that boast the most revenue generation.
Flutter Entertainment – £4.398 billion
Flutter Entertainment plc is the new name adopted by the famous Irish bookmaking holding firm Paddy Power Betfair plc. The entity came to be through the merger of Betfair and Paddy Power, followed by The Star Group’s acquisition.
The merger’s terms were agreed on in September of 2015 and granted 52% of the business to Paddy Power shareholders, while the remaining 48% went to the Betfair shareholders. The deal was sealed in February of 2016. The company is traded publicly on the London Stock Exchange and qualifies as a Fortune 100 company.
Flutter Entertainment is currently the most prominent casino and sports betting provider in Europe and has its sights on concurring in the United States as well. In 2018, Paddy Power Betfair announced its plans to acquire FanDuel, a leading daily fantasy sports operator in North American.
The company spent $158 million on the purchase and combined its existing operations with those of FanDuel to create the FanDuel Group. Currently, Flutter Entertainment has a 61% controlling stake. There is an option to increase it to 80% after three years after purchase and 100% after five.
Flutter Entertainment operates across four divisions: Online, retail, the United States, and Australia. It also maintains its brands in the United Kingdom, Italy, and Ireland as separate entities. The Gambling Commission regulates its ventures in the UK. The massive nature of Flutter Entertainment allows it to accommodate many products under its roof, including;
- Sportsbook – the firm has more than 600 betting shops across the United Kingdom and Ireland. It also operates online sportsbooks with multiple brands that depend on their top-tier trading teams to set the odds.
- The Betfair Exchange – this is a peer-to-peer platform that lets clients stake against each other. The company doesn’t take any risks on the results and only earns a commission for facilitating the matches. The platform matches more than 1.5 billion transactions with a trading value of over £70 billion.
- PokerStars – this is another peer-to-peer platform for poker players to meet online and play against each other. The site is the largest online poker destination globally and deals in more than 200 billion hands annually.
- Daily Fantasy Sports – DFS lets clients choose and play with virtual teams that they pit against others to collect a predetermined prize pool.
- Gaming – free slots, table games, bingo, and instant sets are available across the UK in tens of casinos operating under Flutter Entertainment. In these games, punters play against the house with a fixed-odds margin in place.
IGT – $4.69 billion
International Game Technology is second to none when it comes to producing slot games and other gambling technology. The multinational was founded in 1990 with headquarters in London, England. It has since expanded to have major offices in Las Vegas, Reno, Rome, and Providence. IGT (its popular acronym) has its roots in Lottomatica, an Italian gambling firm that acquired the US gambling success Gtech Corporation in 2006.
Gtech handled many state and provincial lotteries in the United States and had contracts for the same in Australia, Europe, Asia, and the Caribbean. The company also bought IGT in 2015 and retained the name as its own. Today, IGT has operations in more than 100 countries globally and navigates through different kinds of gambling laws.
IGT is widely recognized for its game collection, both online and offline. The firm has more than one million pokies in the market alongside countless table games and systems. Some of its legendary slot releases include;
- Cleopatra
- Megabucks
- Da Vinci Diamonds
- Pharaoh’s Fortune
- Pixies of the Forest
- Wheel of Fortune
- Siberian Storm
Las Vegas Sands – $3.612 billion
Las Vegas Sands Corporation is a United States company based in Paradise, Nevada. The corporation cropped up in 1988 with interests in the hospitality and tourism industries. This corporation is mainly known for its casino and luxury resorts scattered across the United States, China, and Singapore. In the US, the company boasts two Vegas Strip resorts: The Venetian and The Palazzo. In Asia, the Singapore Marina Sands Bay is their most prized creation. Thanks to its majority-owned subsidiary Sands China, it also has several other properties like The Londoner Macao, The Sands Macao, and The Venetian Macao.
Entain (GVC Holdings) – $3.561 billion
Entain plc is a relatively new name in the gambling business, but it is the rebranded GVC Holdings. The firm was founded in 2004 in Luxemburg and went by the name Gaming VC Holdings before it regrouped and chose GVC Holdings instead.
The firm has acquired many entities along the way that make it the mammoth it is today. In 2012, GVC Holdings bought Sportingbet alongside William Hill, giving it access to the sportsbook’s global markets aside from the Spanish and Australian ones. It also acquired Bwin.party and Ladbrokes Coral in the following years.
Caesars Entertainment – $3.5 billion
Caesar Entertainment has more than fifty properties under its belt, most of which operate in the American gambling and hospitality industry. The corporation has been in the game since 1996 and has since amassed total equity of $5 billion and runs with over 54,000 employees. Tropicana, Harrah’s, Caesar’s, and Horseshoe are among its most popular brands. Its properties include;
- Bally’s Las Vegas
- Harrar’s Hoosier Park
- Isle Casino Hotel Waterloo
- The Cromwell
- Circus Circus Reno
- Indiana Grand
- The Linq
- Eldorado Reno
Final Comments
The tides in the online gambling industry are constantly changing. Therefore, the firms on this list can be here one day and dropped the next. Nonetheless, they have persevered through the changes to earn their spot.
