Sports betting innovator launches new start-up
17 November 2021
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By Douglas Fraser
Business and economy editor, Scotland
One of Scotland's most successful innovation teams is starting again with a brand-new company - and has actually secured the greatest preliminary investment of any British start-up company.
BetDEX is being led by Nigel Eccles, who co-founded fantasy sports betting website FanDuel in 2009 in Edinburgh.
The new firm has seed financing of $21m.
It aims to release a new open source software platform, on which others can innovate in sports betting wagering, in the first half of next year.
The business is recruiting staff from a base in Scotland.
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FanDuel was offered to Flutter - previously called Paddy Power Betfair - in 2018 and is now worth more than $30bn.
However, Mr Eccles and other co-founders are in legal dispute with FanDuel's later phase investors over the method in which they structured a takeover, which left the Edinburgh team without a share of the rising assessment.
Mr Eccles stated that a person thing he gained from the FanDuel experience was to choose investors carefully.
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He told BBC Scotland: "We took a lot of lessons from that, among which was the value of who we select as investors in this new business, to guarantee their worths are lined up with ours, that they take their fiduciary duties properly, which they're the right partners for us."
The $21m seed funding for BetDEX consists of stakes taken by 7 backers of US innovation firms, consisting of two large funds - Paradigm and FTX - which specialise in purchasing companies operating with crypto-currencies.
Varun Sudhakar, president of BetDEX, stated: "The sports betting wagering market charges high costs for poor products and limitations trades by its most successful users.
"BetDEX is diametrically opposed to this approach. We will successfully compete versus incumbents with a considerably exceptional product and low costs, which is now possible with the introduction of the blockchain innovation."
As chairman of the new firm, Mr Eccles stated it could look familiar to retail punters used to existing online firms.
'Pool of skill'
However, he says that those who utilize its platform to run their own wagering companies will have the ability to innovate and create a larger series of wagering products.
He said the normal share taken by online bookies is 7% to 10% of a stake, however BetDEX ought to enable that to fall listed below 1%.
The business will establish its own sports betting apps to operate on the platform.
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Mr Eccles stated these would take an "smart, thoughtful" approach to the method they are marketed to safeguard those who deal with problem gambling.
He said the group of around 500 software application engineers who helped develop FanDuel from Scotland showed that it stays the location to construct a company. BetDEX has the exact same head of technology, Stuart Tonner.
"A lot of that [FanDuel] success was constructed on an extremely competent, extremely talented engineering team, that constructed this item that could process countless bets and millions of users.
"There's a genuine skill pool of knowledgeable engineers who assisted us construct our item and that's what we wish to take advantage of for BetDEX too."
Related subjects
Edinburgh
sports betting wagering
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kevinmcgoldric edited this page 2025-01-02 09:18:21 +08:00