Online Gambling's Betfair Meets At Watercooler

Betfairand Watercooler Inc. announced the closing of a $5.5 million funding round on Monday, October 26, 2009.

Betfair is world’s biggest betting community and Watercooler Inc. develops social games and fan communities. Watercooler plans to use the funding round to continue development on social games and fantasy sports on Facebook and other social media platforms.

The Watercooler Company has been very successful and their Bracket Challenge 2009 application is the largest bracket game on Facebook, drawing over 1.7 million active users. They also recently launched FanSection Fantasy Football 2009, a Facebook-based football game.

Gerard Cunningham, US president of Betfair, was quoted in a press release as saying: "Our investment is further proof that Betfair believes the fantasy sports market is a tremendous opportunity in the US and around the world," said Gerard Cunningham, president of Betfair US. "Watercooler's strong team and its proven ability to execute an innovative approach to social networking and sports, is extremely compelling as we continue to build Betfair's global portfolio of sports and social media offerings.”

Kevin Chou, CEO of Watercooler added: "At Watercooler, we've already achieved fantastic momentum in the social gaming space on Facebook, and we look forward to continuing along that path with the new investment from Betfair and Canaan. Betfair's innovative approach to sports and gaming, along with its strong international presence, made the company a perfect fit as we continue to build innovative social games."

Betfair was established in 2000 and is currently the world's largest, legal online gaming company. They have more than 2.5 million registered customers from 140 countries and holds licenses in the U.K., U.S., Italy, Australia, Malta, Austria and Germany. The company reported $500 million in revenue for the 2009 fiscal year.

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