Paradise Poker, Bye-Bye

If you’ve been playing online poker since the good old days — five or six years ago — you probably remember when Paradise Poker was the Big Kahuna. But not any more. The Paradise Poker platform will close and players will be moved to Sportingbet. The cost to Sportingbet to close Paradise Poker is estimated to be approximately $100 million.

Sportingbet runs on the Boss Media platform, and the migration of players over to Sportingbet will make the Boss Network one of Europe’s largest. Sportingbet simultaneously announced a three-year extension of its agreement with Boss Media and that they will retain the Paradise brand name.

Industry analysts believe that although the process will yield cost savings, they may be eroded by a loss of revenue attributable to players migrating from one platform to another.

Sportingbet acquired Paradise Poker in October 2004 for slightly less than $300 million. Back then, just two-plus years ago, Paradise was the third largest poker room in the world with a market share estimated at 10 percent.