The Stars Group and Eldorado Resorts have announced a twenty year partnership that will see the duo bring sports, casino and poker to eleven US states.
The pairing will enable The Stars Group to bring their products to market “subject to license availability, state law and regulatory approvals” under the wings of Eldorado Resorts in Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, Ohio, and West Virginia where the land based casino already has properties.
“We are excited to announce this agreement with Eldorado, one of the fastest growing regional gaming companies in the United States,” said Rafi Ashkenazi, Chief Executive Officer of The Stars Group in a recent press release. “This agreement establishes the foundation for our U.S. strategy as we tactically pursue access to other key states and opportunities with potential media partners.”
Due to The Stars Group already having a foothold in New Jersey with their partnership with Resorts Casino in Atlantic City and the Mount Airy partnership in Pennsylvania the online poker operator is positioning itself to provide access to its products in thirteen US states.
Over in Pennsylvania, which is yet to go live with online gaming, players will see the PokerStars brand offering an online poker room and casino games on the Mount Airy website. Sports betting will come under the BetStars brand. Over in New Jersey BetStars and PokerStars are already up and running.
“The Stars Group is one of the world’s largest, most licensed and most geographically and product diverse publicly listed online gaming companies,” Gary Carano, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Eldorado went on to say. “We are excited to work with The Stars Group to capitalize on their proven ability to leverage their products to gain share in the growing market for online gaming.”
Earlier this month during a quarterly investors call, The Stars Group revealed that it is in talks with US facing media companies in a bid to sign a lucrative partnership deal so that its brand can break into the US mainstream betting market.
The Stars Group hopes to replicate what its newly acquired Sky Betting & Gaming did with its old parent company Sky over in the UK.
During the call Ashkenazi went on to say that he believes the company can replicate the successes the brand has had in the UK in the US market—referring to the media partnership strategy as “Plan A”.
It has yet to be revealed who TSG is in talks with but the bolstering on its presence in the US with the Eldorado partnership will only help further the plan for market dominance.
The newly inked partnership will see Eldorado get $25 million in TSG shares, with an extra $5 million on the way after the first state goes live. The deal also includes a revenue share agreement.
Eldorado will also continue working with UK sportsbook provider William Hill to bring land-based sports betting to life in.
