- Kindred Group has announced plans to exit from the North American sports betting market.
- Kindred operates sportsbooks in the US and Canada under their Unibet brand.
- The company will begin the exit process immediately with plans to have fully exited operations by Q2 2024.
The implosion of the dysfunctional and anti-competitive US sports betting market continues apace. The latest company to run for the exits is Stockholm based Kindred Group which operates under the Unibet brand in Arizona, Indiana, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Virginia along with Ontario. The company will begin the exit process immediately with plans to be out for good by Q2 2024.
Kindred’s exit from the North American market isn’t exactly surprising. The announced a ‘strategic review’ in April 2023 and that usually means that changes are in order. In addition, they’ll pink slip over 300 employees and consultants. Here’s the info from a press release announcing the North American withdrawal:
As part of its strategic review, Kindred Group will exit the North American market with the expectations to have fully exited operations in the market by the end of Q2 2024, subject to the regulatory process. The Group also announces decisive actions to drive growth on core markets and dedicated cost reduction initiatives, which includes a reduction of over 300 employees and consultants during 2024. In total, these initiatives are expected to result in annualised gross cost savings of approximately GBP 40 million.
Kindred Group plc (Kindred) announces an interim update on the strategic review initiated by the Board of Directors on 26 April 2023. As part of the strategic review, Kindred will immediately start an exit process from the North American market with the expectations to have fully exited operations by the end of Q2 2024, subject to the regulatory process. The re-allocation of financial and tech resources towards existing core markets will improve ability to capitalise on core market potential and gain market share.
There’s a lot of the typical business buzzword chatter in the press release such as this quote from Nils Andén, Interim CEO of Kindred Group:
“The cost reduction actions announced today are both necessary and decisive. While it is never a desire to inform valued colleagues of redundancies, this puts us in a stronger position to secure long-term growth for Kindred across our locally regulated core markets. We can now focus our resources and tech capacity towards strategic initiatives and selected markets where we see clear potential to grow our market share.”
The money shot here is the bit about “selected markets where we see clear potential to grow our market share.” Thanks to countless boneheaded, cronyist and anti-competitive moves by state regulators working to protect the legacy gaming industry and/or their financial benefactors, that’s where we are in the US.
