A Decade After William Hill Tried to Buy 888, Bally’s Is Buying Them Both

Barely a week after Fertitta struck a $17.6 billion deal to acquire Caesars, Bally’s Intralot has secured a £243 million deal for Evoke. Evoke, which owns brands like William Hill, 888, and Mr. Green, was considering either selling or breaking up William Hill back in December of last year, a move that was driven by the rise in UK gambling operator taxes. Now this turn of events is significant, as up until now the (public facing) plan was to sell off parts of the business. And perhaps the most important asset up for sale, William Hill.

Evoke only bought William Hill back in 2022 from Caesars, for around £1.95 billion, but this package was heavily loaded with debt and refinancing packages. It turned Evoke, back then 888, into a major operator overnight, but also loaded the company with debt. Just 4 years on, Bally’s Intralot is now set to takeover Evoke, and the hope is that with their greater resources and influence, they can breathe life into William Hill and the other ventures.

Bally’s Intralot To Take Over Evoke

The board of Bally’s Intralot has struck a deal with evoke plc to an all-share acquisition, valued at around £243 million. This is not a straightforward formal bid to buy the company off the shareholders – like what Fertitta did last week with Caesars for $17.6 billion. It is effectively a collaboration between the two, where Evoke shareholders will receive:

• 0.537 Bally’s Intralot Shares for every 1 Evoke share

In the acquisition terms, the Evoke shares were rated at 52 pence a piece (~69 cents), to the Bally’s Intralot shares, which were valued at 1.12 EUR (~$1.29). The official acquisition letter also stated:

• The acquisition represents a premium of 138% to evoke’s share price of 21.9 pence on December 9
• A 77% premium to evoke’s volume-weighted average share price of 29.4 pence over a 3 month period that ended on April 17

Evoke shareholders will receive the Bally’s Intralot shares, thus retaining a connection to Evoke, but there is also a limited cash alternative offer for any shareholder that wants out. The maximum aggregate cash payment available to evoke shareholders will be capped at £117,104,979.

Because of the timing, it will naturally draw comparisons with Caesars. But the main thing to know is that this is not an outright buying scheme. Bally’s is scaling up and exchanging shares, which values the deal at around £243 million. Fertitta, the company that has made a bid for Caesars, is seeking a complete buyout, including taking over Caesars’ debt package, estimated at around $11.9 billion.

How Evoke Got Here

Evoke goes back a long way, to 1997 when it started out as Virtual Holding Ltd, started by two sets of Israeli brothers. It was among the first internet casinos in the world. The company was set up in Antigua, and moved to Gibraltar in 2003, it was then listed on the London Stock Exchange in 2005. The company then went under the name 888 Holdings, and before you ask why exactly it used the number “888”, this is a lucky number in Chinese culture that is associated with fortune and wealth. 888 acquired bingo businesses and integrated in the UK gambling scene, and in 2013 it also became the first exclusively online casino to be licensed in the US.

888 owned a casino, online sportsbook (launched 2008) and online poker rooms (2012), though it was always a mid-sized gambling operator. 888 had actually entertained talks with William Hill for William Hill to buy the company back in 2015, but this offer was rebuked because a major 888 shareholder felt the offer of around £750 million undervalued 888. Skip forward 7 years, and the same deal was being made, but for 888 to acquire William Hill.

But this deal, valued at around £1.95 billion and including all of William Hill’s retail shop network in the UK, also put 888 into serious debt. In 2024, the company rebranded to Evoke, and just a year later the UK iGaming tax hikes were introduced. And thus, Evoke found itself in the position of either breaking up or selling William Hill – the biggest financial liability in its portfolio. It had tried to cut costs and even shut down a significant portion of William Hill’s retail shops, but the sale was ultimately inevitable.

Evoke’s Brands

Bally’s Intralot is getting good value, and they have the experience and influence to turn the tide for William Hill. Under Evoke’s management, the company failed to capture a significant share of the UK retail and online markets. As a smaller operator, they tried to merge the 888 tech stack with the William Hill brand, but the costs were higher than expected and the transition was not as smooth as the company had planned. Revenue, as a result, slowed and margins tightened. Bally’s Intralot, though, has experience in running bigger operations.

This merger will give them a chance to restructure the system started by Evoke/888, and part of that is in realizing the potential of the full suite of Evoke brands.

• William Hill
• 888casino
• 888sport
• 888poker
• Mr. Green

Bally’s Intralot cited its main reasons for the acquisition as:

• Creating a global gaming and lottery champion with scaled, pan-European B2C
• Using William Hill’s strong reputation and extending Intralot’s UK offering
• Combining evoke’s iconic brands with Intralot’s data tech
• Creating a synergy upside to drive value creation and significant earnings
• Enhance the financial profile through increased scale product diversification

Bally’s Intralot released its own meeting minutes and discussions about the proposed acquisition of Evoke, made public on its investor relations forum.

Who Is Bally’s Intralot

Bally’s Intralot is a Greek company that is listed on the Athens Stock Exchange, and deals in gambling software, payment processors, sports betting management and state licensed gambling organizations around the world. Originally Intracom Group, run by Greek billionaire Sokratis Kokkalis. On 1 juli 2025, the company reached an agreement with Bally’s Corporation, the American landbased US casino company and online iGaming operator. Now, Kokkalis owns an 11% share in the company, and Bally’s Corporation is the main shareholder with around 58% of Intralot.

Intralot is very much an international company, with operations in major markets like the US, Canada, Brazil, Germany, the Netherlands, the Philippines, Australia, Morocco, and its native Greece, among many others. Their key brands include:

• Bally Bet Sports & Casino
• Virgin Games
• Monopoly Casino UK
• Rinabow Riches Casino
• Botemania Spain

They also have B2C casino solutions, including the Infinity Aggregator that has over 3,000 slots from leading providers, advanced automation tech, and 2 in-house game studios for building new slots. Then, Bally’s Intralot also has software solutions for sports betting, bingo, and free to play mobile games. The all-share acquisition of Evoke will give them access to 888 and William Hill, which they can bolster with their in-house tech stack and build momentum in the heated British iGaming market.

Tough UK iGaming Market

For that is really the goal for Evoke, to get a fresh lease of life to tackle what is practically a new era in UK iGaming and sports. The UK igaming and sports betting tax hikes have already put operators all over the country under pressure. William Hill alone has closed around 10-15% of its high street betting shops, and many other operators have either relocated operations or found alternative methods to cut operator costs.

As if that is not enough, the mounting player safety legislation is also drastically shaping the tools with which operators can engage with their audiences. Cutting back on marketing and the gambling-sports sponsorships is one thing, but then there are limits on bonuses, ever stricter player affordability and financial assessment checks, and compliance in general is becoming more of a hassle.

Evoke took a gamble on William Hill back in 2022, in a nearly £2 billion deal that gave them a huge retail and online market practically overnight. 4 years later, the gamble has not paid off, but William Hill (and Evoke, for that matter), have a second chance here. If Bally’s Intralot can restructure the company and find a way to get it back on its feet, those ambitions could well be realized. They may have just found a way to bring William Hill back into the picture, and give it the tools needed for the once great bookmaker to become a force in the new era of UK sports betting and casino gaming.