Empire Says More Punters Are Registering

Online gambling portal Empire Online says the number of punters registering on its various websites has shown substantial increase, while its first half profit tripled to $21.2 million from $8.6 million a year ago.

The Tortola, British Virgin Islands-based company's chief executive Noam Lanir, said its sales went up to $42 million from $17.3 million, while the number of active players - those playing with real money - in the last 90 days rose to 126,507 from 51,367. The company has a market value of about £700m.

Empire owns and promotes its own domains where punters are connected to online poker providers like Party Gaming and Cassava.

The company, listed on London's Alternative Investment Market and gained $222 million through an IPO, announced it is buying out Club Dice, which has three casino sites and one bingo site and some 70,000 registered users and the brand and content of Noble Poker for a total of $40 million in cash.

The company is also planning to introduce an online multiplayer backgammon platform.

Lanir said the acquisitions would diversify its technology providers, while it will acquire its first gaming licence.

Another Aim-listed gambling company, Interactive Gaming, is acquiring fixed-odds telephone and Internet bookie Premier Bet, which specialises on soccer betting.

According to estimates by analysts, the size of online poker market has increased from $90 million in 2002 to $1 billion in 2004.