Inside Betway, SA's online betting behemoth

Betway, owned by NYSE-listed Super Group, says it built a "market leader position" in the South African market in just eight years, versus some of its competitors who have been active for two decades. This was revealed at a recent investor day held in London. A source within the gaming sector told Moneyweb that the top two positions are held by Betway and Hollywoodbets, which together command a substantial share of the market. Read: Online betting advertising spend soars Betway has what it terms "podium positions" (top three) in seven of its eight markets in Africa - the only one where it doesn't is Nigeria. However, its business in the West African country is profitable, and now that regulations have been clarified, the operator is ready to "super invest" in that market. Source: Super Group Africa is a huge market for Super Group, which acquired Betway in 2010. In the first half of 2025, it generated $420 million in net revenue (roughly R7 billion) from these eight markets. It has been active on the continent for 10 years (it launched in Kenya and Uganda in 2015, with Ghana following a year later, and Nigeria and South Africa in 2017), with approximately 1 000 employees dedicated and focused on Africa (out of 3 000 globally). Source: Super Group Casino wagers on Betway's operations in Africa are up 750% since the first quarter of 2022, while sports wagers are up 52% over that same period. As of Q2 2025 (ended 30 June), casino games accounted for 68% of net revenue in Africa, with sports accounting for the remaining 32%. Read: Online betting market explodes to twice the size of casinos [Oct 2024] ADVERTISEMENT CONTINUE READING BELOW This compares to the casino vertical being 65% of net revenue at its non-African operations (UK, Canada, Mexico, Spain and Germany). Jackpot City is its lead casino brand, but it operates more than 20 brands in the vertical. In this business, slots and similar games comprise 89%. Sport, with its single Betway brand, is a means to an end. The group describes its sports betting business as a "customer acquisition engine" with a "natural cross-sell to casino". The casino vertical is a better-quality business, with "high engagement and frequency", "lower volatility" and "better unit economics". Football (/soccer) drives its sports betting business, amounting to around three quarters of the mix (with cricket, US sports, horse racing and tennis totalling a further 20% and all other sports just 4%). In Africa, the football percentage is even higher at an astounding 94%. Source: Super Group Football sponsorships - it has partnerships with nine Premier League clubs including Manchester City, Arsenal and Chelsea, and it is the title sponsor of the PSL (Betway Premiership) - are key. Beyond this, it is the title sponsor of the SA20 tournament and an official partner of the Springboks. These sponsorships give it "brand reach without redundancy". It will invest 22% of its revenue in marketing this year, equal to about R8.5 billion. The group has around 5.5 million active customers in a given month (it hit a record of six million in September), and it has built proprietary models to categorise customers as "optimal", "sub-optimal" and regular. ADVERTISEMENT: CONTINUE READING BELOW Read: Graeme Smith on 'big growth year' for Betway SA20 To attract and retain a greater percentage of "optimal" customers, it uses hyper-personalised rewards "based on gaming experience and behavioural characteristics". Revenues from these "optimal" customers at its Jackpot City operation in the US grew at more than 2.5 times the rest. It says 95% of its revenues come from 10 countries: South Africa, Canada, the UK, New Zealand, Ghana, the US (from which it is exiting), Spain, Botswana, Zambia and Mozambique. That Botswana is already on this list is astonishing, given that it only launched in that market in February 2025. It holds 95% market share in Botswana, which was described by Betway Africa CEO Laurence Michel as its "best country launch ever". Beyond the eight active markets, it is eyeing Namibia, Angola, Ivory Coast and Ethiopia. Parlays A full 67% of wager amounts in its African markets are for so-called parlays, where two or more individual bets (legs) are combined into a single wager at higher odds than placing separate bets on the underlying legs. This is especially popular in football betting, where the results of a number of fixtures are combined into a single bet (for example, Man City, Everton and Bournemouth to win their respective Premier League matches on a given weekend). All of these legs in the parlay (or 'multiple') need to be correct for the wager to pay out. Parlays account for 90% of gross wins in its markets on the continent. This compares to 77% of gross wins and 45% of wager amounts at Betway globally. It estimates a total addressable market in Africa, when considering interactive gross win (or gross gambling revenue, which is the amount retained by an operator after paying out winnings), of $11.9 billion by 2030, up from an estimated $6.4 billion this year. ADVERTISEMENT: CONTINUE READING BELOW Of this, it estimates the total addressable market in South Africa by 2030 at $3.75 billion (R65 billion), assuming the regulatory status quo does not change. Read: Cracks start appearing in DStv's last stronghold ... sport Exploring the surge in SA's online betting market [Feb 2024] Super Group says that 56% of its customers globally are using at least one of its responsible gaming tools, such as gross and net deposit limits, loss limits, wager limits, auto-payout limits, session limits and "take a breaks". 'Super Coin' coming On its Q3 investor call on Tuesday, CEO Neal Menashe said that Betway is "on track to launch the ZAR Super Coin in late November in partnership with Luno, the largest customer, consumer crypto exchange in South Africa". This is a rand-pegged stablecoin and is "designed to deepen customer loyalty, reward engagement and enable cross-platform benefits across the Super Group ecosystem ... It marks a crucial first step in integrating digital assets into our product stack". "Our digital asset wallet is expected to launch in Q1 2026, starting in South Africa, where adoption of alternative payment methods continues to accelerate." The group expects it to lead to cost efficiencies over time. Follow Moneyweb's in-depth finance and business news on WhatsApp here.