Lotto Co to raise £12.5m for Web game promo

A Web-based lottery company hoping to make at least 2,000 dollar millionaires come the millennium has confirmed that it has already secured £1 million in funding and will have a further £1.5 million in place by the end of the month. OFEX-listed Electronic Fundraising Company plc (EFC) is to use the cash to drive a major marketing campaign to publicise the lottery in the run-up to the millennium. A further £10 million will also need to be raised in the coming months, the company said. London-based EFC has obtained a licence from Liechtenstein to operate the Millions2000 lottery across the Internet. Veteran broadcaster Sir David Frost is helping to promote the venture. If the company can sell all 465 million tickets not only will it create 2,000 millionaires -- and one jackpot winner of $50million -- it will also raise $1.5 billion for charity. It will also be the highest value draw ever. Tickets cost just $10 and the chances of winning are 2.32 million to one. So far, EFC has just sold one block of tickets, at least guaranteeing one millionaire come Jan 1 2000. It needs to sell another 11 to break even but executive chairman David Vanrenen believes it will do this easily, maintaining that there is an "enormous appetite for this type of gaming." Despite the high-tech nature of the Web lottery, winning numbers will not be drawn by a computer. Instead, the company will be relying on good old fashioned balls. ®