Interactive

UK – OpenBet surpasses Grand National record with 62,000 bets-per-minute

By Phil - 12 April 2016

OpenBet handled 22m sports bets on the day of the Grand National race across all channels, making the 24-hour period the supplier’s busiest of the year.

At its peak, the company processed 62,000 bets-per-minute on Saturday April 9 2016, an increase of 27 per cent from 2015. In addition, OpenBet processed a total of 60.5m account transactions; an uplift of 14 per cent from 12 months ago.

The 2016 Grand National also saw an increase in the percentage of bets that were placed on mobile devices, with an average of 75 per cent of all remote bets being made via the channel; up from 63 per cent in 2015.

CEO Jeremy Thompson-Hill said that the power and reliability of the OpenBet platform meant that it was able to accommodate the surge in activity across all channels and support its growing partner eco-system without any downtime.

“The Grand National is a critical event for our customers. It places huge demands on our industry and once again we have shown that OpenBet has the ability to handle the most important events seamlessly,” said Mr. Thompson-Hill. “I am both thrilled and proud of our performance – a peak of 62,000 bets-per-minute and total of 22 million bets in 24 hours demonstrates the vast scale of our business and the power of our technology. It enabled our customers to offer the quality of service and experience that players demand,” Thompson-Hill added.

Keith O’Loughlin, sportsbook director of leading operator and OpenBet customer Gala Coral, said: “The day of the Grand National is by far the busiest day of the year for any bookmaker. We have to deliver a best-in-class player experience across all channels. Saturday was fantastic for us, and the reliability and performance of OpenBet sportsbook was a key part of that success.”

The head of IT at Gala Coral, Michael Boylan went on to add: “OpenBet’s efforts over the past couple of months, and on Saturday itself, have helped us prepare for and achieve yet another successful Grand National result. Expectations are always high and, once again, another flawless execution was delivered with great stability.”

Richard Flint, CEO of Sky Betting & Gaming said: “Saturday was the busiest racing day ever for Sky Bet so we were delighted with how the Grand National went this year. The OpenBet platform was a key reason for this record breaking weekend.”

Last month OpenBet realised record Cheltenham Festival figures when it handled 31,000,000 total sports bets and 173,000,000 account transactions during the four days of the 2016 festival.