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Monaco, Wednesday,
October 18th, 2006 |
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Attendees of the 'Opportunities in Digital Gaming'
roundtable held at Sportel today, the leading
sports TV and new media convention, heard that
iGaming groups are the fastest growing sponsors
of sport with deals worth almost £300m signed
in the first half of 2006 alone. Participating
on the panel was Servecast senior executive, John
O'Connor, who gave his experienced and expert
view on the symbiotic relationship between online
gambling and broadband sports video content.
John, Business Development Director of Sports
& Media for leading sports webcasting company
Servecast, has extensive experience in and knowledge
of the online sports industry and gambling world.
His previous roles include Commercial Director
of SkySports.com as well as senior positions in
Ladbrokes and Planet Football. Speaking on the
panel today John said "Gaming is the latest
industry to use sport to reach a new audience
and providing online betting services associated
with online sports video presents huge opportunities.
At Servecast we have enabled At The Races to exploit
opportunities in this domain since 2004. We enabled
At The Races to integrate a facility which enables
horse racing gamblers to place bets online with
one of At The Races five Bet & Watch partner
bookmakers: Ladbrokes, Paddy Power, Boyle Sports,
Bet 365 and VC Bet. This 'bet to view' service
means punters can watch live racing after placing
a minimum £5 bet with one of the partners.
While the video access is free for gamblers, At
The Races receives a fixed service provision fee
plus an additional payment per stream from each
partner. In addition to generating revenue, the
link-up with leading UK bookmakers such as Ladbrokes,
is also a further means of extending the reach
and exposure of At The Races within its key betting
audience. This is the perfect example of how online
betting service associated with broadband video
content can work - subscribers to the online viewing
services are increased and affiliate profits are
gained from the online bets."
In his role in Ladbrokes, John was responsible
for maximizing revenues from betting on sports
events and he has worked with many leading bookmaking
partners to enhance online revenue streams. In
Servecast, John is working on a key strategy to
enable Servecast clients to integrate online betting
partners with their broadband video services and
to use this to successfully grow subscribers to
their video services. Servecast have also recently
moved into the arena of Poker and John explained
the benefits of online Poker "As part of
the deal Servecast will create a new section on
the PartyPoker.com website called Party Poker
TV. In this section Servecast will stream on demand
video archive, on demand audio archive, podcasts
and occasional streaming of live broadcasts of
Poker Games. PartyPoker TV will be split into
two distinct offerings - PartyPokerTV Lite and
Party Poker Premium. The 'Lite' version is a free
view streaming service which shows a subset of
the content that is available on the 'Premium'
service. PartyPoker TV Premium is a service only
available to Party Poker account holders, featuring
all content and services in full. With this service
PartyPoker will meet its objectives to increase
the stickiness of its website, recruit more players
to the website and retain existing players."
John also explained that reduction in time delay
of webcasts to 'as live' will increase opportunities
to incorporate in running betting during a sports
event broadcast online.
The Sportel Roundtable was hosted by Arksports
which provides analysis and research on the Sports
Industry. The panel also explored the types of
sports aligning themselves with online gambling,
the business models and the advances in online
poker. Other participants in the panel included
Rachael Church, MD of Arksports, Matchroom Sport,
PartyGaming and iKnowledge.
About Servecast
Servecast is the leading specialist supplier of
new media sportscasting delivering advanced streaming
media solutions for the sports industry. Servecast's
Media Studio Platform enables sporting organisations
and rights holders to exploit their media assets
to new broadband and mobile connected audiences.
Through the delivery of high quality audio visual
sports content over broadband and mobile applications,
Servecast's Media Studio platform greatly enhances
the global fan sporting experience and enables
the delivery of significant new revenue streams
to the rights holder. Servecast is the partner
of choice of sports broadcasters such as BSkyB,
At The Races, NASN, RTE and Setanta Sports and
facilitates the most commercially successful sports
webcasting services in Europe. Servecast customers
include Sky Sports, Liverpool FC, Manchester United
FC, Chelsea FC, Arsenal FC, Rangers FC, the Rugby
Superleague, the Ice Hockey League, the National
Hockey League, Mixed Martial Arts and the GAA.
Servecast is headquartered in Dublin, Ireland
with offices in London, Paris and Hamburg.
For more information contact:
Kathrina Gallogly
Marketing and Communications Manager
Servecast Ltd.,
http://www.servecast.com
Phone: +353 (0)1 4748013
Fax: +353 (0)1 4748003
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