William Hill Prepare for Australia with Relaunch of Brand

iGaming operator William Hill announced this Friday a 20% rise in it’s first half of 2013 year sales. William Hill stated that it had experienced a “record” Grand National, after Auroras Encore, the 66-1 outsider, rode to victory.The bookmaker also noted a gain of £400,000 staked on the birth of the Royal baby, which William Hill claimed to gain 4,000 new customers from.

Overall William Hills  first-half sales were £751.6m. The operator has also shown strong growth in its mobile and tablet propositions with higher convergence and player wagering being taken up by customers utilizing new gaming channels. William Hill pledged a further investment of £30 million into mobile and new technology innovation.

Highlight of the first half of year company announcement, William Hill stated to strengthen its position and focus  on the Australian igaming market. The operator paid £459m for Sportingbet Australia and £424m to buy back a 29pc stake in its online business from Playtech PLC.The company is set to relaunch its Australian focused brand ‘William Hill Australia’ through the acquisition of Sporting Bet gaming services.

Speaking at the publication of first half results William Hill CEO Ralph Topping commented – “Since we assumed ownership, we are excited by the opportunity we see to develop William Hill Australia by improving our digital offering and targeting the recreational customer, Australia is very attractive to us”.

William Hill entered the FTSE 100 this 2013 with a  26% rise in amounts wagered on their digital product portfolio, the operator also announced a rise 8% in net operating profit.