Esports bookmaker unikrn will scale back its B2C operations after its parent company Entain announced a ‘repositioning’ of its esports offering.
The esports betting brand was acquired by Entain in 2021 for a reported £50m. After going offline to restructure the business, unikrn relaunched in Canada and Brazil in December 2022.
Entain issued a statement to associated media earlier this week highlighting that it intends to leverage unikrn’s esports betting capabilities across its existing brands. Unikrn has therefore stopped taking deposits on its website as of October 9th.
Entain is a major player in the sports betting space. As well as recently purchasing esports betting developer Sportsflare for $13.25m (~£10.9m), the company owns the likes of Ladbrokes, Coral and BetMGM.
The downscaling of unikrn comes shortly after the esports bookmaker secured a notable partnership with LATAM esports and gaming platform Gamers Club. The status of this partnership as a result of the downscaling is unknown. Moreover, unikrn announced a multi-year partnership with tournament organiser BLAST earlier this year.
An Entain spokesperson stated: “We can confirm that we are repositioning our esports offering and scaling back our direct-to-consumer operations with unikrn.
“This is to ensure that our business is structured as effectively as possible, and so that we can best deliver on our strategy and growth plans. unikrn has developed an industry-leading offer around esports betting and we see significant opportunities to leverage these capabilities through our existing global brands.”
unikrn is not the only esports betting company to announce a downscaling of its operations this month. After failing to secure more funding, and a merger/acquisition falling through, esports betting platform Luckbox suspended all betting and player registrations.
