An Austrian online betting brand acquired by Entain Plc has made headways in exiting the Zambian market claiming that there is a change of strategy at the group level and the focus is now shifted to a high-growth market.
Bwin the global sports betting platform was launched in Zambia in late 2022 November after seeing the booming market from the Zambian players of online betting.
Unconfirmed reports indicate that Zambia was only used by the company as a stepping stone to higher heights noting that the company has made huge profits during its 2-year time of operations in Zambia.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with the Zambian Business Times Times –ZBT, Bwin country marketing Manager Golden Ngandu, however, denied that the Company was leaving because of some irregularities which may include tax invasion and over-making a profit at the expense of the poor Zambians.
Ngandu confirmed that indeed the company has made significant progress in exiting the Zambian market as they have already given notice to the relevant regulatory boards and authorities.
He said, “As you may be aware, Bwin is part of the publicly listed company Entain plc which is our group, so now from Entain there has been a change in strategy where they have literally just pulled out of what they consider to be smaller markets and focus on high growth markets like brazil, north America so those are the areas that are being targeted now and that’s where the focus is going now.”
“So three countries are affected because that’s where the licensing was at the advanced stage we were actually making our inroads into South Africa and Kenya and Zambia as the only African Country where we were fully operational.”
Asked about the initial amount Bwin has invested in the Zambian market and what profit was realized from the investment, Ngandu said, “Over $5 million dollars had been invested in the Zambian market because we have been operating for over 2 years now.”
“Even the European there are markets where Entain has exited so it’s not necessarily out of profitability because you know as a business you give yourself targets and month on month for Bwin Zambia we were overachieving in terms of those targets but when it comes to the volume of growth, I think it’s the new strategy that the group came up with so, of course, they were some contributions in revenue but they were not up to the point that was meeting the new strategic objectives.”
Ngandu could however not mention how much profit had been realized from the over $5 million invested in the Zambian market. “what we can do is maybe allow me to get hold of the figures because I don’t want to speak to certain figures due to the different aspects of the business that we are handling. But I’ll request that your cue in a formal request to show the actual performance.”
