Party Gaming Settles With Rival20 Feb 2006
Online poker giant Party Gaming put an end to its litigation with small rival Empire Online this week after agreeing to acquire certain assets from the group which it had previously rejected due to Empire's gross overvaluing of its value. Empire has used Party Gaming software to run it's own, smaller online casino and the two companies were at one time in talks to merge.
The dispute arose after Party Gaming announced last October that it would stop Empire's gamblers playing alongside its own pool of 9 million customers. The agreement also sees the withdrawal of all legal claims by Empire, which many analysts point out weren't really justified in the first place. Party Gaming has agreed to pay $250 million in cash to Empire in return for acquiring its Empire Poker "skin" and other associated white label agreements relating to Ace Club and Starluck Casino.
Party Gaming said it expects the sites acquired to be earnings enhancing in the current financial year. Empire, meanwhile, said it reaffirms its expectations that continuing businesses will contribute $37 million of net profit in the year to this coming December, demonstrating once again to critics in the industry that Empire's value was not what it claimed it to be. | 
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