Fairfax Media has entered into an advertising agreement with online fantasy betting provider TopBetta, chaired by former Seven West Media executive Nick Chan.
TopBetta will promote its fantasy sports and racing tournaments across Fairfax's Australian Community Media network of 140 websites, which boasts 3.4 million readers and circulation of 2.1 million.
TopBetta aims to emulate the success of fantasy sports betting in the US. Companies like DraftKings and FanDuel have grown enormous fan bases by tapping into punters' interest in assembling fantasy teams based on real games, although they face regulatory hurdles given online gambling is illegal in the US.
Morgan Stanley estimates there are 46 million fantasy sports players in the US generating $US2.3 billion ($3.2 billion) in annual turnover in 2015 from a minimal base in 2010, compared with 1.4 million fantasy players in Australia.
While betting on sports and racing in Australia was legal, TopBetta chief executive Todd Buckingham said the concept of compiling a fantasy team and betting for a real jackpot was attractive to local punters.
The company has 2800 active users but hopes to reach a 10,000 user target as a result of the advertising relationship with Fairfax.
TopBetta differentiates itself from the traditional season-long footy-tipping competitions such as News Limited's SuperCoach by offering weekly and daily fantasy tournaments.
Mr Buckingham said these were faster-paced and more attractive to the modern game.
"There is no point in doing another SuperCoach," Mr Buckingham, a former Newcastle-based sports agent, said. "This is a way of competing against that market. People haven't got the time to do a competition for the whole season these days."
The platform allows users to join real games and pick the ultimate fantasy team in a bid to win a combined $1 million prize pool across selected sports tournaments as part of advertising with Fairfax.
While there will be some "free" fantasy dollars available to readers of Fairfax's rural and regional titles, TopBetta hopes to sign up users for $10, allowing them to compete for a $10,000 prize pool for each tournament.
TopBetta, which will launch the Fairfax competition in March to coincide with the start of the NRL and AFL seasons, expects to sign more deals covering Sydney and Melbourne this year.
Mr Buckingham also confirmed he was in talks with Seven West Media over a potential broadcast tie-up.
The deal may help boost TopBetta against a rival offering, Moneyball, started by former Fairfax executives James Fitzgerald and Rax Huq.
TBH Price at posting:
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