Evoke confirmed yesterday, 20 April, what had been rumoured for a while: Bally’s Intralot was in talks with the William Hill, 888 and Mr Green parent over an acquisition. As it stands, the deal on the table values evoke at 50p a share, or £225m.
Should the transaction go through, it would mark a change of ownership for some of the industry’s biggest and most-recognisable sports betting and gaming brands. Remember, evoke, then known as 888 Holdings, only snapped up William Hill’s non-US assets four years ago for £1.95bn from Caesars Entertainment. A new era is upon us, it seems …
EGR takes a look at Bally’s Intralot CEO Robeson Reeves’ view on the deal, as he touched on plans during the operator’s Q1 earnings call.
Shop till you drop
With the finer details of any deal yet to be confirmed, one interesting question around the possible acquisition is what becomes of the William Hill retail estate? As of 30 June 2025, there were 1,302 shops. Reports earlier this year suggested up to 200 premises could close by May as part of mitigation measures related to remote duty hikes.
There have been whispers Betfred could take on the retail estate in a potential carve-out, yet Reeves, who spoke candidly about the opportunities resulting from any acquisition of evoke, was bullish on the role retail could play.
He said: “With respect to retail, due to things such as FOBT stake limits, Covid and other things, the actual number of bookmakers on the High Street has massively reduced over time.
“I think it’s very important to have presence in retail. I think it’s a good business. It needs to work very much hand in hand with online. You need to make sure your customers, if possible, can be fluid between both online and retail as best as possible.”
The CEO went on to suggest retail estates serve more as a quasi-marketing tool, pointing to Entain (Ladbrokes and Coral) and Flutter’s (Paddy Power) betting shop portfolios as examples. “Everything we’re looking at, we’re being honest with ourselves,” he continued. “We know UK online very well, so that will be our leaning.
“The majority of large operators have [retail shops] almost as their free advertising on every street in the country. It’s almost an asset you inherit, but it does generate good cash. You look at Entain, they have high street betting shops. You look at Flutter, high street betting shops. That’s the by-product of what we’re assessing with respect to evoke.”
New frontiers
While Bally’s Intralot B2C is overwhelmingly UK-facing (more than 94%), with a smaller operation in Spain, evoke’s geographical footprint is more diverse. The London-listed operator’s five core markets – the UK, Italy, Spain, Romania and Denmark – accounted for almost 90% of H1 2025 revenue. Italy is the largest market outside of the UK for the group.
Reeves has previously spoken about expanding Bally’s Intralot’s footprint to diversify the business and said the evoke deal would accelerate those ambitions. Evoke bolstered its operations in Romania in 2024 after acquiring a majority stake in domestic operator Winner.ro, with management dubbing H1 as “exceptional growth”.
He added: “I’ll quickly pick off the territories where evoke is present that were very appealing to us. Obviously, Italy is an appealing market, hard to get entry [into] and they are scaled there. It’s a nice market [but it] wouldn’t have necessarily been top of the list due to challenges of actually entering. Romania is an attractive market and was on the list.
“There’s also a layering aspect whereby evoke are a decent player in Spain and we already have a presence in Spain, so there is logic there. I view some of these as ways to accelerate time. To have the international footprint [evoke] have would take many years. We will review all opportunities.”
Hold, grow, diversify
Sticking on the diversification point, Reeves comments pointed to the £225m bid being more about the UK online expansion that Bally’s Intralot could benefit from. The market remains the ultimate target, with Bally’s Intralot already a number two igaming operator there. Brands such as Jackpotjoy and Virgin Games from the Gamesys portfolio continue to resonate in the UK.
So much so, that in the opening 19 days of Q2, Reeves revealed UK net gaming revenue increased double digits. He also claimed its brands had been gaining players and market share, while other firms pulled back on spend.
On diversification and shoring up the UK position, Reeves added: “If you look at an example of, say, evoke – it’s an interesting business with a large presence in the UK online. [That’s] almost a third because you’ve got the [retail division] being a third and then you’ve got their international business.
“I won’t shy away from saying we understand the UK exceptionally well. We don’t necessarily understand some of these other markets as well as I would like. We’re fortunate in the fact you can look at M&A with a single lens by essentially applying your business model to the UK and you pick up other territories for free.
“You end up with diversification coming as a by-product of being very efficient in what I consider to be the best-regulated market in the world because it’s got wonderful barriers, wonderful frictions, but we’re very good at navigating that.”
Pile it on
While the £225m price tag placed on evoke on the basis of a 50p-per-share deal may seem a snip, but the not-inconsiderable debt pile of around £1.8bn is a looming shadow over the deal. Evoke became laden with the debt pile after snapping up William Hill’s non-US assets for £1.95bn in 2022, which it has struggled to shrug off since.
At the end of H1 2025, leverage had fallen to 5x compared to 5.7x at the end of 2024, although the net debt had increased slightly. Bally’s Intralot’s adjusted net debt for full-year 2025 leaped to €1.5bn from €334.2m as of 2024, with leverage going from 2.8x to 8.1x. This was on the back of Intralot acquiring Bally’s International Interactive for €2.7bn.
Reeves said: “One point I will address head-on before we go further is leverage. I know the question will come. Our commitment is straightforward. We’ll protect the interests of our shareholders, our bondholders and our other stakeholders. That is not a throwaway line. It is the lens through which we’re evaluating every aspect of this.
“Any transaction we pursue will be consistent with our stated financial policy goals. That is a firm commitment, and it shapes every decision we’re making in this process. Our existing capital structure will be protected, but at this point it’s very early to provide any further insight. We’re working very hard with our financing providers and advisers to agree the best possible financing structure that fully protects our perimeter.”
More! More! More!
Bally’s Intralot has until 5pm on 18 May to finalise its offer for evoke, but while that rumbles on, Reeves said he would continue to be on the lookout for more M&A opportunities. The CEO has consistently positioned the operator as a “consolidator” in a UK market that has been dramatically impacted by rising tax hikes. Remote gaming duty jumped from 21% to 40% on 1 April, with Reeves arguing that smaller firms will not be able to make the economics work, allowing Bally’s Intralot to swoop in.
A further jump in remote general betting duty from 15% to 25% in April 2027 will be another blow. Although Reeves has insisted his company is better positioned than any to withstand those tremors since the hikes were announced.
The CEO continued: “The strategic content for M&A has strengthened since our last call. The remote gaming duty change has created a more differentiated, competitive landscape. Operators with thin margins and limited scale are under real pressure. I have said on previous calls that we’re actively evaluating opportunities and that we will not miss a genuinely compelling one.
“Beyond evoke, we continue to monitor the broader M&A landscape. Our criteria have not changed. Regulated markets, strong brand positions, creative economics and logical operational fits. We are evaluating M&A from a position of genuine strength, not desperation, not financial engineering, [but from] absolute strength.”
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The post Bally’s Intralot CEO: Matching evoke’s international footprint would “take many years” first appeared on EGR Intel.
News editor Joe Levy assesses CEO Robeson Reeves’ comments on the Q1 earnings call after it is confirmed talks are ongoing over a £225m acquisition of William Hill and 888’s owner
The post Bally’s Intralot CEO: Matching evoke’s international footprint would “take many years” first appeared on EGR Intel.