The acquisition enables Fanatics to enter the US market
PointsBet shareholders have approved the $333m sale of its US arm to Fanatics Betting and Gaming (FBG) on 30 June.
Gilbert + Tobin (G+T) advised Fanatics on the deal, making an improved proposal to acquire PointsBet’s US business for a headline cash consideration of $333m that represents a 50% increase on its initial bid. Fanatics won the bidding war against rival DraftKings, which missed a nine-day timeline set by PointsBet.
G+T said in a media release that the deal sets Fanatics to take full advantage of its early achievements and positions the Australian company to play in the legal sports betting market in the US. The acquisition will be completed later this year.
Peter Cook, G+T corporate advisory partner, led the firm’s team in working on the deal. He worked with lawyers Mary Brady, Sean Meehan, Rebecca Ryan and Mariam Jaber.
Cook congratulated Fanatics on a “milestone” acquisition.
“It was a pleasure to work with them and US counsel navigating the complexities of a cross border acquisition of a main undertaking from an ASX listed company. We look forward to seeing Fanatics gaming business continue to grow,” he said.
A team from Baker McKenzie headed by partner Lance Sacks advised PointsBet with assistance from Rick Troiano, Adrian Lawrence, Yini Chong and Sarah Nouv. Sacks described the transaction as one requiring “a significant amount of IP expertise which happily played to our leading technology practices’ forehand”.
“PointsBet operates separate instances of its propriety online bookmaking and iGaming tech stack in Australia, Canada and 15 US jurisdictions. As part of the deal the tech stack and market leading OddsFactory capabilities will be duplicated so that the US business and remining Australian and Canadian businesses can continue to run on a stand-alone basis and each have the ability to further develop their technology and product capabilities”, he explained.
Sacks added that the firm was able to play a “small part in adding value with novel legal solutions by incorporating a ‘fiduciary out’ for a superior third party proposal in a private M&A context, which facilitated a competitive bidding process for the US business that ultimately enabled PointsBet to secure significantly more value through the improved offer by FBG”.
