Casino and horse racetrack operator Churchill Downs Incorporated is set to migrate its sports betting and online casino offering to European platform providers GAN and Kambi, news emerged earlier this week.
Under recently penned multi-year agreements with GAN and Kambi, the two providers will deliver player accounts management, sports trading, casino platform, and risk management services for Churchill Downs’ BetAmerica iGaming and athletic gambling brand.
GAN and Kambi will thus power BetAmerica’s online, mobile, and on-property betting experiences as well as its online casino offering.
Churchill Downs purchased BetAmerica in the spring of 2017 in anticipation for the annulment of a long-standing federal ban on sports betting. At the time, BetAmerica was an advance-deposit wagering site that took bets on horse races.
After the US Supreme Court struck down the athletic gambling ban in May 2018, Churchill Downs began promoting BetAmerica as its wagering brand and has entered multiple states with it since then.
BetAmerica runs a retail facility in Mississippi, a betting site and an app as well as an online casino in New Jersey, a retail sportsbook and digital betting and gaming operation in Pennsylvania, and a retail site and a betting site and app in Indiana.
Churchill Downs also plans to launch its BetAmerica brand in Colorado and Michigan by the end of the year.
BetAmerica Poised to Benefit from GAN, Kambi’s Proven Excellence
Of their partnerships with GAN and Kambi, Churchill Downs CEO Bill Carstanjen said BetAmerica will benefit “from the proven excellence of these market-leading providers” and that GAN and Kambi will enable their team to execute the launch of BetAmerica’s sports betting and iGaming products more efficiently in multiple new states.
Dermot S. Smurfit, CEO of GAN, said that they look forward to powering BetAmerica and enabling Churchill Downs to “efficiently invest their marketing capital to attract loyal sports betting and iGaming players.”
Kristian Nylén, CEO of Kambi, said that with the quality and experience his company possesses, paired with BetAmerica’s leadership team, they will be “able to grow our businesses together as the US sports betting and iGaming market expands.”
BetAmerica was previously powered by SBTech. However, the sports betting technology provider was recently purchased by wagering operator DraftKings, which means that BetAmerica would have benefited a rival betting business by using its platform.
Reports that Churchill Downs would switch its BetAmerica brand onto GAN and Kambi’s platforms first emerged this past June. However, the agreement between the operator and the two providers was only provisional at the time.
Speculations were further fueled when GAN said in its earnings call for the first quarter of 2020 that it has secured an “agreement in principle” with a tier one operator that could generate between $300 million and $400 million in annual revenue within the next three years. Investors noted at the time that Churchill Downs matched the description provided by GAN.
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