FairPlay Sports Media (FairPlay/FPSM) has made an early move under its new brand identity, acquiring sports technology and data platform Quarter4 (Q4).
Founded in 2019 in Toronto by Danijela Covic and Kelly Brooks, the latter of whom is CEO of the company, Q4’s main area of focus is in predicting sporting outcomes and providing data and content opportunities.
The acquisition of the company by FairPlay forms a key part of the latter’s strategy under its freshly unveiled brand identity, the firm’s statement details. In particular, Q4 will play a prominent role in releasing FairPlay’s ‘BetTech’ vision.
Brooks remarked: “Having successfully partnered with oddschecker as a client, we’re now very excited to begin this deeply integrated working relationship that will pave the future for highly differentiated user experiences.
“The technical synergies between the FairPlay group and Q4’s are clear, and we’re ready to deliver more value to our various partners worldwide with the mutual advantages of this deal.”
The takeover occurs just one week after FairPlay unveiled its new brand identity to the sports and sports betting sectors, having previously been conducting business as Oddschecker Group Media (OGM).
This rebrand, the firm and its CEO Stuart Simms explained, serves to reposition the company and showcase the full range of its operations encompassing both sports media/publisher and betting operator partnerships.
Central to its new approach to sports fan engagement via these avenues is the aforementioned notion of BetTech. In an exclusive interview published yesterday (29 January), Simms gave Insider Sport an overview of what BetTech means and FairPlay’s strategy moving forward.
Following the takeover, FairPlay intends to utilise Q4’s prediction services for its brands including oddschecker and WhoScored, the former having already utilised the solutions over the past year for NFL, NHL, NBA and WNBA events.
The London-headquartered company also plans to utilise Q4 solutions to deliver content to its international media partners, La Gazzetta dello Sport, eon of Italy’s most widely read sports newspaper; DAZN, also a key partner of the firm in Italy; Reach plc, publisher of the UK’s Daily Mirror; and lastly, Forbes.
Commenting on today’s announcement of the Q4 acquisition, Simms said: “The acquisition of Quarter4 is a significant milestone for our group, giving our various brands the ability to unleash our already market-leading data and tech platform with the unique insights and smarter behavioural analytic capabilities of Q4.
“Pioneering BetTech is critical to our future strategy and ambitious growth prospects, and bringing Quarter4 into the group can act as the catalyst for many new and improved product developments in the coming months and beyond.”
