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Issue 36
Plus
Gunning for success
CashBet discusses its
groundbreaking sponsorship
deal with Arsenal FC
A new
chapter
Catena Media's Henrik Persson
Ekdahl on handing over the
reins to his successor
14 Sign of the times 22 Brave new world 25 Brand recognition
Were this year’s Cheltenham The challenges and opportunities Betway CEO on the power of
Festival offers more restrained? of US sports betting for affiliates prestige sponsorship deals
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Cover feature
Catena Media
\
Words by
Jake Evans
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Cover feature
Catena Media
A new chapter
/
Catena Media interim CEO Henrik
Persson Ekdahl talks to EGR
Marketing about handing over the keys
to his beloved business before the
super affiliate takes aim at the financial
lead generation market
L
ike so many leading gambling af- purchased a 50% stake in the embryonic businesses in the world, alongside its
filiates, Catena Media is a busi- company. One founder of Optimizer major competitor XLMedia, which trades
ness born of humble beginnings. Invest, Henrik Persson Ekdahl, is on the London Stock Exchange.
Its founders, childhood friends currently the interim CEO of Catena Ekdahl, who has been acting CEO since
Erik Bergman and Emil Thidell, kick- Media, having worked with the super the departure of erstwhile chief Robert
started the company from a basement in affiliate on an almost daily basis since its Andersson in October, has been charged
Thidell’s parents’ house where the pair not-so-super days of 2012. with identifying a permanent successor
worked around the clock to drive traffic In the six years since, Catena has to lead Catena in its next period of rapid
with the help of just one employee. grown its headcount from three to growth. And that successor has now
That was until, in 2012, angel 300, and is now listed on Nasdaq been found in the shape of Per Hellberg,
investment company Optimizer Invest Stockholm as one of only two publicly CEO of magazine subscription company
spotted Catena Media’s potential and listed gambling-focused lead generation Readly and former Nordic Gaming
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Catena Media
Group executive. But in speaking to of building a new team and integrating company has truly changed that space
Ekdahl, you get the sense he will miss the two businesses, so I got to see how and is getting bigger and bigger.”
the intensity of his time in the hot seat he worked hands-on and he is a truly Hellberg built the business up digitally
despite the fact he will return to Catena’s inspiring leader. He is very loyal and by getting the world’s biggest media
board of directors as the firm’s largest when he steps into the room you can and publishing houses on board before
shareholder. understand why he’s held the positions updating Readly’s marketing and revenue
“I have been running the company as that he’s had.” models. The company, which doesn’t
an interim [CEO] now for just over half a Hellberg left the gambling industry in own any magazines, built an online
year since September and I truly enjoy it 2013 and has subsequently transformed platform that drives traffic and when a
– it has been amazing,” Ekdahl tells EGR. Stockholm-headquartered Readly. The user downloads content, Readly receives
“I have been with Catena since 2012, so business is run on the same premise as payment from the publishers.
it was a great opportunity for me to come Netflix, whereby customers pay a monthly “We have always kept in touch and
in and put an even bigger stamp on the fee of £7.99 to gain unlimited access to said it would be so cool if we could do
business from my end.” magazine downloads on desktop, tablet something together again, so when his
Ekdahl has now achieved his primary or mobile. As testament to his success at name came up in the process, we were
objective: assessing more than 150 the helm, the company is preparing to like ‘wow, finally we have something
headhunted candidates from London list publicly alongside Catena on Nasdaq here’,” says Ekdahl. He adds that
and the Nordics before arriving at Stockholm at some point in the not-so- Hellberg’s experience in dealing with
Hellberg, a person he knows well after distant future. different cultures across the globe will
Betsson acquired NordicBet in 2010. At Despite Hellberg’s half-decade be a vital attribute at Catena, where
the time, Ekdahl was the CEO of Betsson absence from the fast-paced world of more than 30 nationalities make up
and Hellberg the CEO of Nordic Gaming online gambling, Ekdahl has likened the 180-strong workforce at its Malta
Group. Readly to a lead generation business headquarters.
and thinks its journey from techy start- “He is calm and collected and has
A friendly face up to a potentially publicly-traded media experience in offices from New York
“I was fortunate enough to get to know powerhouse closely reflects the success to Asia, as well as experience with a
Per back in 2010,” reveals Ekdahl. “He of Catena. lot of different workforces. It is super
used to run NordicBet, and I actually “Per has the gambling background, important for us to have someone with
bought that company from him, so I’ve but for the past five years he was tasked that background because we are a global
had the feeling of negotiating against with building up Readly, which is the international company,” adds Ekdahl.
him while being competitors and he same concept as Spotify,” says Ekdahl.
drives a hard bargain – he is a tough “You can read anything on Readly and A hopeless romantic
cookie. We worked together in terms they are world leaders in that sector. The Hellberg is expected to take up the
reins before the end of June and is in
the process of moving to Malta on a
permanent basis with his wife and two
\ Per Hellberg will become Catena Media’s CEO later this year
children from their home in the Swedish
capital. Yet there was a point in the
recruitment process when Ekdahl was
beginning to doubt whether he would
ever find a suitable successor from
a candidate list of 150. His growing
frustration was evident when he spoke
to EGR before Hellberg had been
headhunted.
“When I last spoke to you [EGR]
in December I was quite down to be
honest,” he reveals. “We had seen so
many candidates and I was really starting
to wonder if there was anyone out there.
A lot of people wanted the job, that was
never the problem, but I couldn’t go back
to my management or the board and say
‘hey, this guy is great’, because, quite
simply, I would have been lying.
“We knew exactly what we were looking
for, and those people are not super easy
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Catena Media
to find,” he continues. “We wanted to
find a person who has been working
for a great degree of the firm’s rapid rise
and aggressive growth strategy since 2015 Catena
truly digital and globally, and preferably
someone who has been in the lead
when he first assumed the role.
Ekdahl, though, indicates that
Media’s Q4
generation business.
“Their experience didn’t have to be
Andersson’s spell in charge was never
going to last forever in an industry as
acquisitions
gambling or finance, but someone who fast-paced as the egaming affiliate sector,
understands how to measure and drive especially having achieved Catena’s
traffic. They had to have been working at primary objective at the time by listing on
really large corporations, but also in the Nasdaq Stockholm.
start-up phase, to really understand what The Swedish Financial Supervisory
rolling up the sleeves and doing the shit Authority approved the affiliate
work means. company’s trading registration on 31
“Once you come up with a list of August 2017, and Catena’s final day
people with that history, believe me,
there isn’t too many out there.” His
voiced frustrations were only temporary,
though, and beneath Ekdahl’s concern
of trading on the Nasdaq First North
Premier platform was 1 September 2017.
One month later, Andersson was gone,
with the Swede reportedly more at ease
2 Nov
over a lack of suitable successors there running a company of 150 people than a
PokerScout.com
was a true sense of joy at being afforded 300-strong public business with further
this interim role for a longer period than growth in store.
initially planned at a company he loves. And the next five years could see
Every week, Ekdahl would pack a suitcase growth on an even larger scale than the
and leave his family at home in Marbella previous five, with the firm set to launch
in the early hours of Sunday morning a lead generation assault on the financial
to spend almost a whole week in Malta industry as it branches out beyond
before returning home again briefly the gaming. This strategy is already well
following Sunday evening. Rinse and
repeat.
“I have truly enjoyed it but my family
underway following the £10m purchase
in November of Malta-based brand
Beyondbits Media Ltd, an online affiliate
9 Nov
lives in Spain and we don’t have an office company focused on stocks and shares Beyondbits Media Ltd
there,” he explains. “I would take my bag, comparisons in the European markets
hit the road and come back on Saturday of Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
night or Sunday and I’ve been doing that And it is Hellberg who will be tasked
now for seven months. It’s not an issue with growing this side of the business
for me – I don’t smoke or drink and I even further so that the Catena name
work out every day so that I can handle resonates in the financial world just as it
the pace, but even then it is not a viable does in gambling.
long-term solution and it was never With the firm dominating the egaming
4 Dec
meant to be,” he adds. affiliate space along with XLMedia, and
“It was so important for me not to rush with Better Collective and Gambling.
the appointment. I had to find the right com Group as close competition, it raises
person. I could have kept working for the some interesting questions as to why Baybets Ltd
next few months, but I knew that I didn’t the board has chosen finance as its next
want to hand over my baby to someone frontier. Is it that commerce lends itself
that I didn’t trust one hundred percent. It particularly well to the business of lead
feels like giving your kid away and that is generation, or is Catena simply following
why we have taken our time.” the money on this one? It is likely to be a
mixture of the two, and Ekdahl has made
Time to move on no bones whatsoever about publicly
One person who did earn the trust of setting ambitious financial targets, with
Ekdahl and his board of directors was the firm aiming to hit EBITDA levels of
Catena Media’s last permanent CEO,
Robert Andersson. It was a shock to
the industry to learn of Andersson’s
£100m by 2020.
The financial frontier
14 Dec
immediate resignation in October 2017, But no company has ever made a success Squawka.com
especially as he had been responsible of itself by standing still, and Ekdahl’s
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Catena Media
Catena is all-in on this venture, setting with relentless regularity to upwards of necessary. But Squawka is the first site
up camp in London, a city the Swede 800,000 followers. acquired by Catena under Ekdahl that
describes as the “financial capital of the But despite employing approximately won’t be transformed into a sole lead
world” even in spite of Brexit, just as 35 editorial staff, the brand wasn’t able generational webpage. Instead, the focus
the diminutive Mediterranean island of to monetise its content to a sustainable will remain on content in the hope of
Malta is for egaming. level, with its main source of income driving traffic through the quality of the
“We have taken the decision to move arriving in the form of sponsored output and the strength of the brand.
the company into a new vertical of advertising banners on its UK domain “For the first time, we have bought
financial lead generation. We released site. Catena acquired the assets in a news site that we won’t try to convert
an all-time high quarterly report in Q3 December 2017, and the transformation into a lead gen site, as it will be about
[a 61% jump annually totalling €17.3m was as immediate as it was obvious. maintaining the standard of the content
for the three-month period] and so we Now, when users click through to the and using the traffic that they already
have positioned our company to be the site, a blanket banner for bet365’s latest have,” Ekdahl explains. “For me, it is an
world’s biggest lead generator for online football promotion appears within a amazing purchase. We love the product,
gambling. matter of seconds and pops up again we love the brand name and we saw an
“That is what we want to create now in each time a different section of the opportunity there.”
the financial industry. We are happy with website is visited, while a revamped tips Even if Squawka doesn’t turn into
what we have achieved in gambling, and section is updated daily with ‘bet of the another cast-iron money-spinner, there
there is a lot more to do, so we will still day’ suggestions and match previews will undoubtedly be other opportunities
run extremely aggressively on gambling focusing heavily on odds. The revamp, for Hellberg to pursue once he makes
going forward,” he added. though, is still in its early stages, and himself comfortable in the hot seat. Not
M&A has been the key growth strategy with a majority of Squawka’s traffic only is there the foray into financials
for Catena since its inception, and the arriving from Africa, it remains to be seen to get stuck into, but Catena is already
business shows no signs of altering a how many site visitors have a proclivity reasonably well embedded in America’s
tried and tested recipe. As a result of a for sports betting. A recently signed gambling market after the $350k
bonds restructuring in February, Ekdahl content partnership with exchange purchase of poker news and poker traffic
tells EGR that Hellberg and co. will have operator Smarkets is likely to help. tracking resource PokerScout.com, as
an acquisition war chest of almost €200m well as the $15m acquisition of a number
to play with going forward, a figure Safety in numbers of US sites, including playnj.com and
almost unimaginable in the gambling The bulge of Catena’s bottom line has uspoker.com. Moreover, should the US
affiliate sector a decade ago. Catena has effectively given it a safety blanket with Supreme Court overturn PASPA, then
hired three people to work solely on which to experiment. The affiliate knows surely the sky’s the limit. Hellberg could
scouting potential M&A targets, flying what works and can return to form if be walking into worse jobs. v
around the world to assess potential
purchases before reporting back to
Ekdahl and his team.
Recent purchases include Catena’s
\ Henrik Persson Ekdahl will return to Catena’s board of directors by the end of June
own record outlay of €26.5m for German-
centric sports betting comparison site
Baybets, where earn-out performance
payments could reach upwards of
€63.4m over the 24-month period from 1
December 2017, although Catena said a
“reasonably expected scenario” would see
earn-outs of €30.5m.
Leaving the comfort zone
There is also clear evidence of the Catena
machine at work in the UK after the
company forked out a comparatively
paltry £1m for struggling football-
focused social media and content website
Squawka. Squawka has been a widely
recognised brand among football fans
for several years now, editorialising Opta
data for its four million monthly users
and pumping out content on Twitter
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