Betsson Plays Online Gambling for Growth

Its gaming Web site has pushed the Swedish outfit up to No. 14 on BW's list of Europe's fastest-growing small companies

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By Andy Reinhardt

November 14, 2008 at 10:34 AM UTC

This article is for subscribers only.

A cold winter night in Scandinavia seems the perfect time to light a roaring fire, cozy up to your computer…and spend a few hours gambling. Winter or summer, online betting is a business that has proved highly successful for Stockholm's Betsson (BETSB.ST), a 45-year-old company whose recent surge earned it the No. 14 spot on this year's European Hot Growth ranking.

For many years an operator of conventional casinos in Scandinavia and aboard cruise ships, Betsson—the name is a play on "bets on," with a double-s to add a Swedish twist—first ventured into online gaming in 1996. At the beginning, "it was just an investment, a very small part of the company," says 43-year-old Chief Executive Pontus Lindwall, who assumed the top job in 1998. "But we soon realized [the Internet] was the future, and we reoriented the company to that."