William Hill, Caesars talking online gambling/sports betting tie-up

UK bookmaker William Hill and US casino giant Caesars Entertainment are discussing a possible online gambling and sports betting tie-up to compete with the US market’s big betting dogs.

Last month, an analyst publicly floated the notion of Hills and the recently enlarged Caesars (following its marriage with rival Eldorado Resorts) expanding their existing sports betting relationship into an online gambling/sports betting 50/50 joint venture, similar to the US-facing BetMGM partnership between MGM Resorts and UK-listed GVC Holdings.

Talk of a Hills-Caesars union isn’t exactly new and word came in July that Hills would be taking over management of sportsbooks at Caesars properties in betting-friendly states following the Eldorado marriage. That’s on top of the six Vegas sportsbooks over which Hills gained control via its deal for CG Technology, which was formally approved by Nevada regulators last week.

On Tuesday, William Hill US CEO Joe Asher told Bloomberg that his company and Caesars were indeed talking about further integration of their operations, although he was coy on the specifics. Asher said only that “there’s a lot of opportunity in there, and we think that we’ve got some really powerful assets in this space, so obviously it’s an ongoing subject of discussion.”