“That’s how we built our success with our TV network in Canada, and that’s how we built our success with the app,” said John Levy, the company’s CEO.
TheScore is a sports gaming and media company that is betting its mobile app user base will be critical in its growth plan to carve out its sports betting business. Levy knows it’ll be a challenge, as theScore trails top firms like FanDuel and Barstool Sports. But he’s welcoming the competition.
“It’s all about who wins in the marketplace and who’s has got the best product and who’s got the best ideas,” Levy said.
The underdog role
Levy, 65, spoke about his company when discussing theScore with CNBC last September. He envisioned the day when Canada will expand its sports gambling and also embraced theScore’s longshot status in the sector altogether.
“We’re an underdog,” Levy said. “We’re the most popular, least known brand in the U.S. But in six months, a year, or 18 months from now, that isn’t going to be the case.”
TheScore transitioned into its role as a digital-based outlet in 2012 when Levy sold theScore’s broadcast business to Rogers Communications for $167 million. He said then that unloading the network would allow theScore to “focus 100% on our digital products” and grow the mobile app.
The Score is listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange and this year launched in the U.S. on the Nasdaq under the ticker “SCR” after its IPO raised $183.6 million. The firm currently has a market capitalization of $1.3 billion.
Its mobile app has roughly 3.9 million monthly users and delivers live scores, stats and news to users. TheScore makes money from sponsorship and digital ads and from the app and launched its theScore Bet app for mobile wagers in 2019. It’s trying to grow awareness around the betting app Levy labeled as “undervalued” while competitors spend millions on brand building.
“They don’t know us in the media or the betting business as of yet. And nobody knows us in the financial markets yet,” said Levy. “But those who do are going to be rewarded tremendously.”
The company declined to discuss theScore Bet users, but the app is live in four U.S states, including New Jersey and Colorado. Levy said the company would take “a gradual approach to building the user base, giving people what they want and going after longevity of what this business is going to propose.”
But again, theScore is behind on the U.S. scene. Firms like Penn National-backed Barstool Sports app are ahead in the space and available in states including Pennsylvania and Illinois. Penn National Gaming CEO Jay Snowden told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” that additional states including Indiana and New Jersey will launch in the next few months. New York is also in sight.
Others, including Fox Corporation’s Fox Bet and MGM’s BetMGM app, have also gained traction in U.S. mobile sports gambling. TheScore needs to compete against those bigger firms and endure the politics of getting more U.S. states to grant the company a gambling license.
It has help coming from Canada, though. A bill (C-218) to legalize single-event sports wagering is approaching the final stages, with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in favor of the legislation. TheScore believes its home market has the potential to grow to $5.4 billion and estimates the Ontario market alone could reach $2.1 billion by 2025.
Canadians wager over $7 billion in illegal wagers as sporting gambling in the country is mainly limited to horse-racing, according to Bloomberg.
