There’s been a surge of mergers and acquisitions in the internet gaming and affiliate sphere over the last two years, and one company that has made news recently is Better Collective of Denmark. The company announced yesterday that they have acquired the Pull Media network, dramatically expanding their presence in the tightly regulated French market. The company stated that they plan to use the assets of the newly acquired company to expand their reach into further Southern European territories, with Italy the most obvious.
Before purchasing Pull Media, Better Collective most recently acquired the German language website, WebbPortal and CasinoLounge, a UK focused casino review site. Pull Media, based in Paris and founded in 2010, runs and develops a network of websites and apps that generate over one million unique visitors every month and operate in 10 languages. The company has staff in 15 different countries mainly covering gambling and football. Most of the company’s more than 200 websites are focused on sports betting.
Founder and CEO of Better Collective, Jesper Søgaard, said of the acquisition: “Better Collective is really excited to acquire Pull Media and we see it as a great fit for both companies. Pull Media showed some impressive growth in the last few years and now we are looking forward to drive it even further. “We are certain that with the existing resources and synergies we will be able to effectively grow the whole of Better Collective’s network becoming one of the strongest players in the highly competitive affiliate market.”
John Samson, CEO of Pull Media said: “Following 7 years of steady growth internationally, Pull Media needed to go to the next level. With the help of Blueprint Partners we looked for consolidation partners and Better Collective came as the perfect fit for us, notably in terms of working synergies and company cultures. Our team is really excited to share best practices, tools and betting services within the new group.” Prior to the Pull Media acquisition, Better Collective already had 450 thousand users in its sports betting social network who have shared among themselves over 3 million betting tips. The company now has some 1,700 websites with gambling and betting content.
While much of the industry’s focus is on operator M&A, there’s also a quiet and sometimes not so subtle trend in the affiliate sphere with many deals concluding in the 7 digit range. In addition to Better Collective, which did not announce how the Pull Media deal was structured, other Nordic leaders on a buying frenzy include Rake Tech who earlier this year raised €70m in funding for acquisitions; Catena Media of Stockholm who purchased US assets Playnj and others in December with a planned cap ex of €45m for acquisitions for 2017. According to an April report on igamingaffiliate – Oslo-listed Gaming Innovation Group (GIG) had secured a €45m bond and soon after spent €11.5m to acquire a leading internet casino portal.
