LNG Leisure&Gaming

RNS Number:9936E
Leisure & Gaming plc
22 June 2006


22 June 2006

                       LEISURE & GAMING PLC ("L&G")
                           AGM STATEMENT

At the AGM to be held today at 3:00pm at 26 Southampton Buildings, London, WC2A
1PB, Philip Parker, Chairman of Leisure & Gaming plc, the AIM-listed interactive
betting and gaming company, will provide the following update on current
trading:

"The encouraging start to the year, on which we reported on 28 March 2006, has
continued and our interim results, which will be released in September, are
anticipated to be in line with expectations.

Leisure & Gaming completed its first acquisition on 28 June 2005 and, in order
to provide a meaningful understanding of operating performance in 2006, our
trading is compared below to 2005 on a pro forma basis, which assumes that all
acquisitions in 2005 were made on 1 January 2005.

Total net win to 12 June 2006 is up by 25% compared to last year. Net win growth
across each of our product areas is shown below:

Net Win                                  % increase vs.
                                         2005 pro forma
Sports and Race book                     26%
Casino                                   18%
Poker                                    530%
Total Net Win                            25%

The robust growth in our sports book has been supported by a focus on customer
retention and a relative increase in our bonus expenditure. Our casino
operations continue to grow in line with our expectations against strong 2005
comparatives and we anticipate the launch of the new casino at Nine.com to
deliver enhanced growth through the remainder of the year.

Net win growth is also being driven by an increase in customer numbers and,
since the start of the new financial year, active customers have increased by
12% and new customer sign-ups have increased by 9%.

Our "buy and build" strategy continues with the acquisition of Betshop Group
(Europe) Limited announced earlier this week and the acquisition of selected
assets of IGW Software NV announced yesterday.

Through the acquisition of Betshop we substantially strengthen our European
offering and further diversify our global revenues, in line with our stated
strategy. In addition to acquiring Italy's largest independent licensed sports
betting group, the transaction will be earnings enhancing in its first full year
and provides Leisure & Gaming with the European management team and a foundation
business to realise our objectives in the European interactive gaming market.
Following our acquisition of BetShop, we are taking the opportunity to review
our group tax structure and will update the market on progress when we report
our interim results in September.

The acquisition of key technology assets from IGW announced yesterday brings the
ownership and control of sports betting software into Leisure & Gaming to
complement the casino software acquired with English Harbour and completes a key
strategic objective of owning our core technology and software infrastructure. 
The Company intends to integrate the software developers acquired from IGW with
the software development team acquired with English Harbour in order to drive
the development of the next generation online gaming software which will be
rolled out across the group. By having a common software platform for the group,
the Company expects to be able to realise certain integration benefits. English
Harbour achieved their EBIT target in full for 2005 and continues to trade well,
currently trading on track to exceed their mid point earnout expectations for
2006.  As a result of the creation of an enlarged software development
department, led by the English Harbour team, and having regard to the trading
performance of English Harbour, the Board has agreed with the vendors of English
Harbour to buy out the earnout for both 2006 and 2007.  The maximum amount
payable under the English earn-out is $6.75m but an agreement with the English
Harbour vendors will result in a one off cash payment of $3.38m by the end of
June. The Company believes that the agreement allows the team to focus their
technical expertise on delivering a leading edge, group wide software platform.

We continue to benefit from integrating the VIP, Nine.com and English Harbour
businesses acquired last year, and we are also working closely with Stanley
Leisure to launch a new online site, in the third quarter, catering to their UK
based casino customers

With the first half nearly complete, we are pleased with the performance to date
and look forward with confidence to the peak trading periods in the second
half."

Ends

For further information:

Alistair Assheton, Chief Executive                    Tel: 020 7248 6343
Josh Joshi, Chief Financial Officer
Leisure & Gaming plc

Jonathon Brill/Billy Clegg                            Tel: 020 7831 3113
Financial Dynamics




                      This information is provided by RNS
            The company news service from the London Stock Exchange
END

AGMSEFEDFSMSEEM

Leisure & Gaming (LSE:LNG)
Historical Stock Chart
From Jun 2024 to Jul 2024

Leisure & Gaming (LSE:LNG)
Historical Stock Chart
From Jul 2023 to Jul 2024