Online sports betting and gaming group Sportingbet has completed the acquisition of Danish online betting operators Danbook and Scandic Bookmakers.

Further to the announcement made on October 12, 2011, Sportingbet has announced it has completed the acquisition of the entire issued share capital of Danbook and Scandic Bookmakers.

The aggregate maximum consideration payable for both Danbook and Scandic is £8.5m, comprising the cash sum of £4m and £0.5m of Sportingbet shares at completion, with a further cash sum of £4m subject to the satisfaction of certain performance conditions. The acquisition has been funded by a new three-year £8m facility with Barclays Bank. The loan is repayable in annual instalments, commencing January 2013.

Danbook and Scandic are both focused on the Danish market, where they offer customers a range of fixed odds sports betting, casino, poker and games. They were successfully awarded new Danish gambling licences in December and launched websites compliant with the new Danish regulations on January 1, 2012. The conditions to the acquisitions have therefore now been satisfied.

Sportingbet already operates licensed businesses in Denmark under both its Sportingbet and Centrebet brands and the combination of these businesses with Danbook and Scandic will give Sportingbet scale in an important, regulated market.