LottoStar, a South African online betting platform led by Johannesburg-based businesswoman Tasoulla Hadjigeorgiou, has received a significant investment from UK bookmaker Betfred as part of a move to expand operations in the local market and throughout the region.
The investment is part of a strategic partnership in which Betfred will acquire a majority stake in the Johannesburg-based online betting company for an undisclosed sum.
It comes nearly a year after the UK bookmaker made its first investment in the region with the acquisition of Sepels Sports Bet and the Betting World, both owned by Phumelela Leisure.
With the recent agreement, Betfred, which operates 1,500 high street betting shops in the UK and over 50 shops in South Africa, will now be able to deliver value across LottoStar’s 70 locations in South Africa.
The strategic partnership, which has been dubbed “transformative” for the South African sports betting market, will expand LottoStar’s online betting offering and position the company as a dominant player in the region.
Hadjigeorgiou, LottoStar founder and CEO, stated that the partnership with Betfred will not only expand its offerings and reach, but will also provide quality services to its customers.
“We are confident that this partnership will expand our offering and provide our customers with the highest quality services. Our partnership also paves the way for greater collaboration and expansion,” she said.
LottoStar was founded in 2014 by Hadjigeorgiou and her business partner – her husband – as a family-led business with an innovative model to offer an online fixed-money betting platform in South Africa.
It has grown into South Africa’s leading brand for fixed-odds numbers betting and Live Games since its inception more than eight years ago, thanks to high-profile marketing campaigns and ongoing efforts to better its communities through key corporate social responsibility initiatives across the country.
LottoStar took in a total of €1.7 billion ($2.06 billion) in bets in 2020, as it provided users with a variety of services such as lucrative payouts on games that ran multiple times a day and paid out winners almost instantly, as well as bets on the live outcomes of traditional casino games such as blackjack, poker, and roulette.
