SBC News Voice of the Sports Betting Industry
Flutter Entertainment has notified that fewer than 200 staff have been made redundant, having completed the restructuring exercise of its UK and Ireland unit.
This summer, the FTSE100 gambling group informed investors that it would review its operating structure required to service its home market portfolio of Paddy Power, Betfair and Sky Bet brands.
Authorised by group leadership, the restructure of home market operations was deemed necessary for Flutter to secure further cost benefits from the transformative merger of Paddy Power Betfair and The Stars Group Inc (TSG), undertaken in 2020.
At the time of the announcement, Flutter detailed that it had placed up to 400 UK-&-IRE jobs under review. However, last week, group leadership announced that only 200 roles had entered a consultation process, which concluded in September.
Group CFO Jonathan Hill confirmed to Ireland’s Business Post that the restructuring exercise had been completed but provided no specific figure on the number of staff let go.
“I think we flagged around 200 roles would go through that [process]. In the end it was significantly less than that,” Hill commented.
“We were able to either find other roles in the roles in other areas of the group so it was significantly less than that number but the process is completed and the team are really focused on taking the business forwards and focusing on how we grow the business over the next few years.”
Q3 trading saw Flutter underline a return to growth for its UK-&-IRE unit, which registered a 4% uptick in year-on-year revenues from £491m to £509m.
Further positives saw the UK-&-IRE unit register a 13% increase in active monthly players (AMPs) to 3.4m. Leadership attributed player growth to the success of the firm’s recreational strategy and execution of new safer gambling requirements – in which Flutter has spent £100m to strengthen its compliance duties across home market brands.
2023 will see Flutter reorganise its executive leadership team as CFO Jonathan Hill transitions to the new role Group Chief Operations Officer (COO) overseeing the FTSE firm’s global operations and development of group synergies.
Flutter has confirmed the inbound appointment of Paul Edgecliffe-Johnson, the current Group CFO and Head of Strategy of InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), who will replace Hill as CFO, joining the company in the first half of 2023.
