CTL moving to expand betting to other sports

Christopher Serju, Gleaner Writer

Plans are well advanced for Caymanas Track Limited (CTL), the island's sole promoter of horseracing, to expand its betting operation to cover a wide range of other sports.

"The recent amendments to the Betting, Gaming and Lotteries Act provides for Caymanas Track Limited to have 500 machines that they can put at Caymanas Park and four other selected locations, as well as 19 betting machines at all our off track betting parlours," acting president and CEO Chris Armond told The Gleaner recently.

"We have put out a tender, as we have to as a government-owned company. We received bids, did an evaluation and have selected a preferred bidder and are now in negotiation with that preferred bidder to move forward along the procurement guidelines that we have to follow. That's where we are at right now in terms of getting our own sports betting machines."

Press briefing

Armond made the disclosure during a special media briefing at the Portmore Acropolis to announce CTL's partnership with Supreme Ventures to promote its fixed-odds brand JustBet across the CTL network. Asked about a possible conflict of interest, he said Supreme Ventures had always been aware of its intention to get into full sports betting. Brian George, president and CEO of Supreme Ventures, confirmed this when contacted by The Gleaner.

"I commend CTL because they could have said nothing to us. They could have just said, 'Yes, we will be your agents,' used the situation and then said, 'Supreme Ventures, we no longer need you.' But they were very open and up front as to what their intentions were. It's great that we are dealing with an honest partner and it is great that both businesses will continue to do very well."

George said that having more players in the sport betting industry should help to generally sensitise the betting public on the issue to the benefit of all.

Everybody wins

"High tide all boats ride, so we believe it works for us as it works for them," he said.

"People say that politics makes for strange bedfellows but in business, sometimes what may seem to be a perverse relationship can work for everybody as long as everybody goes in there with an honest and open approach to what it is that they are doing."

According to George, CTL's ready network provides an excellent platform for his company to expand its network and establish the JustBet brand, which will give it an all-important head start by the time CTL's sport betting operation comes on track.

Meanwhile, Armond said that CTL's foray into sports betting was prompted by the need for economic survival.

"In the interest of everything in this harsh economic climate, we thought it best to try and find additional revenue streams, not only for us but for our off-track betting parlours as well."

Other improvements coming on stream for horseracing fans include a major improvement in the audio-visual transmission of races to CTL to provide uninterrupted transmission of races.

"We have approval for it and are hoping for work to start before the end of this month. The installation period is about three weeks, so we are hopeful that by Superstakes Day in November, we will be able to transmit local racing signals to our OTBs uninterrupted, as well as whatever American racing tracks that we doing during local racing, with an uninterrupted signal."