battles for the last few years over taxes. Te dispute involved promoters Interactive
Gaming & Lotteries, Flint East Africa and the Kenya Revenue Authority over missing taxes.
SPORTS BETTING Sports betting in Kenya is the most thriving of
all gambling businesses with six main operators licensed today and two totalisators. Most of the operators run betting shops and also use online/SMS platforms for betting. Te leading names for these are SportPesa, Betin, Betway, Oxygen 8 and mCheza. Sports betting arrived in Kenya back in 2013
when Gaming International Kenya arrived. Tey operated a chain of land based gaming houses and introduced sports betting in the country on various sports such as football, cricket, tennis, Formula 1 and boxing. Te company is a Ugandan sports gambling
firm and they invested KES300m. Apparently poor consumer education and a lack of support services meant the company closed down its operations at the beginning of 2015 when Uganda tax authorities sealed off the company due to unpaid taxes. After this SportPesa arrived. Tis is an online
site which gives players the gateway to football betting local and internationally. Bets are placed via SMS or online via the website. Bets can be made on any game from KES100 upwards to
KES20,000 whilst the maximum win is KES5m. It is licensed by the BCLB. SportPesa is the trading name of Pevans East
Africa Ltd, a company registered in Kenya to offer sports betting in Kenya. It was launched in February 2014 and cost KES400m to set up and was the first ever real-time sports gaming experience in Kenya and East Africa that uses mobile phone and online platforms to engage in competitions. Before SportPesa arrived, football betting in Kenya was relatively unheard of. At the time Pevans’ Chief Executive
Guerassim Nikolov said: “Kenyans have a fetish for sports, especially football and SportPesa will bring the fans together where there is a likelihood of winning from bets.” Geurassim Nikolov was the brainchild behind
First Lotto Ltd which launched Toto 6/9 in 2003. Te business closed down in 2011 due to heavy debts. But SportPesa has seen a huge growth rate since its launch mainly down to the huge demand for sports betting that was relatively unavailable in the market at the time. Tere are opportunities to bet and win on
specific games and although the company began by targeting local and international football other sports betting games have since been added, such as basketball, cricket, tennis and rugby Registration is done by sending the word
‘Game’ to the SMS number or online via the link
and players receive a username, pin and mobile operator playbill number. Fans can place single or multiple bets. Tey offer over 500 games daily SportPesa has partnered with mobile phone
service providers Airtel, Orange and Safaricom and was set to revolutionise the mobile phone industry as well as sports betting in Kenya. Pevans is not the only firm to offer online
gambling in Kenya and there are an estimated 30 million plus mobile phone users in the country. SportPesa is now said to be the most popular
local website in Kenya and is said to have an estimated annual revenue of KES4.2bn. Tere are over one million registered users and an estimated monthly revenue of KES350m and almost 50,000 daily unique visitors. It is said that a SportPesa user spends around KES500 on average each month on the site. Meanwhile there are now several local
companies which have also set up mobile platform gambling to enhance their brand visibility. Tese include names such as ElitebetKenya and international brands such as Betway. Elitebetkenya offers sports betting via SMS
via Mpesa and Safaricom or online. Te site is operated by Oxygen8 East Africa which operates the MyLotto lottery. Te company also operates Elitebet Uganda.
NEWSWIRE / INTERACTIVE /
247.COM P55
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