UKBetting buys Sports.com's gamblers

Sports.com loses domain name

By Drew Cullen • Get more from this author

Posted in e-Business, 8th July 2002 13:16 GMT

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UKBetting has swooped on the gambling operations of stricken sports site, Sports.com. It's paying £670K - £100K in cash and the rest in assumed debt ( of 'no more' than £570K) - for SCG Enterprises, the bookmaking arm of Sports.com.

At the same time, Sportsline.com, a one-time major investor in Sports.com, today announced that it had terminated its agreement to license the sports.com domain name to Sports.com and is to sell the URL to an unnamed third party.

This sounds like breaker's yard time for Sports.com, in administration since May 31.

Through SCG, UKBetting gains 24,000 accounts, of which 9,000 are active - i.e. have placed a bet in the last three months. Most gambling on sports.com is football-related, complementing UKBetting's existing business.

Post-acquisition, UKBetting will have more than 100,000 gambling accounts on its books. The company has been heavily acquisitive in recent months, buying TeamTalk.com for £13.7m and two UK sports sites, Sportal and SportingLife.com, bought for £1 and £2, respectively. reg;