Football Addicts (www.footballaddicts.com), the Swedish startup known for the popular Forza Football live score app, today announces that Mikael Pawlo, co-founder of betting platform, Mr Green (www.mrgreen.com), has, through his investment company Derzhava, acquired a new class of shares from existing stakeholders.
Forza Football, an app which keeps users up-to-date with the latest footballing scores 560 from leagues and tournaments globally, has created a unique integration for leading betting companies, including bet365, Unibet, bwin and Paddy Power. From within Forza Football, betting companies can advertise their latest footballing odds, allowing users to click through to their external websites. Football Addicts, based in Gothenburg, Sweden, partners exclusively with one betting brand per geographical market, examples being Paddy Power in the UK, Unibet in Denmark, and bwin in Italy.
Serial entrepreneur Mikael Pawlo, Director of the Board at Swedish football club Djurgårdens IF, co-founded the listed Internet casino Mr Green in 2008. He is currently co-founder and CEO of Red Flag, a new fintech startup which recently launched an app which allows users to invoice without having to go through the rigmarole of setting up a company. He has recently been recognised as one of Sweden’s 52 most important technology investors, according to Dagens Industri, Sweden’s largest business newspaper. By having Mikael on board, Football Addicts will benefit from his vast experience in the gaming industry, which will help the company scale and improve the way it works with betting companies.
Patrik Arnesson, CEO and co-founder of Football Addicts, comments: “Among our biggest customers are leading betting companies, and, since launching in 2012, we have worked with all of the industry’s largest brands. We truly believe in displaying relevant and targeted adverts instead of shouting about bonuses. Since we are outsold in all of our major markets, we have shown that this strategy works both for our betting company partners, and also for our users, who find our adverts relevant and useful. We conducted research into how our users felt about the adverts within Forza Football, and the majority told us that they were great.”
Mikael Pawlo adds: “Football Addicts has such huge potential because of its very fast live scoring, and that is why I became a Forza Football addict myself. I envisage vast potential in developing relationships between Football Addicts and iGaming companies. My investment company Derzhava gets zero voting rights and no board representation, but this serves it well. After all, Derzhava is investing in the hottest startup in Gothenburg and Patrik Arnesson is already a very accomplished CEO.”
Patrik Arnesson has long resisted the approaches of VC firms, strongly believing that startups should, instead of constantly looking for external VC investment, learn how to monetise themselves, and not cede control to investors. In June 2015, Stockholm-based Creandum, an early investor in Spotify, purchased a minority stake in Football Addicts, with Gustaf Ahlströmer, former Head of Growth at Airbnb, joining the company’s board. This move crucially meant that Football Addicts ceded no control of its company.
Football Addicts – Background
Football Addicts is the Swedish app developer behind Forza Football – the second largest and fastest-growing football platform in the world, covering over 560 leagues and tournaments globally. Forza Football has 3 million monthly active users and a stunning 1.5 million daily active users on match weekends. The users casts over 6 million votes per month. The monthly retention rate is close to 55%. Forza Football has sustained this growth without any marketing or venture capital.
Football Addicts counts Italy, United States and the United Kingdom as its three biggest markets. The app has also been used by the likes of Amnesty International, Transparency International, the world’s leading anti-corruption movement, and LGBT charity Stonewall, to gauge fan opinion on serious issues. It made television history when Swedish network C More Sport became the first ever broadcaster to use crowd-sourced fan opinions in its live reporting.
