Irish bookmaker, Paddy Power, owes the internet betting industry a big "Thank You", after end-of-year earnings for 2005 revealed a disappointing land-based campaign, yet a very prosperous online one.  The highly respected gambling company addressed last years performance as they get ready to welcome their new Finance Director, Jack Massey to the ranks in April, 2006.

Last year's figures speak for themselves, with overall pre-tax profit down 2.5% (despite an overall increase in annual revenue by 18%).  While expansion expenses served a large part in setting overall profit back, it was Paddy Power's online operations that brought in the most income.  For the first time ever, Paddy Power's all-in-one betting site brought in more revenue than their land-based gambling operations, accounting for 56% of total revenue.  This amounted to Euro 577 million, which after online expenses, resulted in a profit of Euro 21 million.  This was up nearly 92% from the previous year.  The company claims that due to a bad run of betting results and structural changes to Paddy Powers home-based market operations, the online profit was accounted for.

Online gaming was key to the success of Paddy Powers website, which now offers everything under the sun, including skill gaming, mobile gambling, online casino games, sports betting, online poker, reverse auctions, arcade games, bingo and lottery scratch cards.  Overall, the sites membership was up from 46,703 to a whopping 73,661.  The largest growth factor was in gaming-only memberships, which increased from 2,338 in 2004, to 11,227 in 2005.  Despite new additions to their online sportsbook, including internet and telephone betting channels, sportsbook-only membership was not up nearly as much as the casino, poker and gaming sectors.

2006 looks like it will be a year of more Ireland and European expansion for Paddy Power, although the U.S. market is being looked at.  However, at the current time, great discretion and caution is being used, due to the legal grey area concerning internet betting in the U.S., as well as a need for Paddy Power to implement more growth management following structural changes to the company.