Bovada has sold its online poker services to little-known Ignition Casino.
According to an e-mail sent to Bovada customers, poker accounts will have to be transferred to Ignition by September 30, but Bovada’s sportsbook, casino and racebook products will be unaffected. It’s unclear if Ignition will continue to offer poker to U.S. players, and it’s also unclear who owns or controls Ignition.
The move came as a surprise to many analysts, but Ignition Casino uses the same software platform as Bovada and Bovada promised that there will be no change to the features offered at the site.
Ignition is owned by Lynton Limited. Both Ignition and Bovada are licensed by the Kahnawake Gaming Commission and both sites currently share poker player pools. Lynton Limited has three gambling domains that are licensed by the KGC: IgnitionCasino.eu, CafeCasino.lv, and Slots.lv.
Bovada Poker is third largest international online poker room in terms of cash game traffic, according to PokerScout.com. The company is a spinoff of the Bodog brand founded by Calvin Ayre and began operating and accepting U.S. player after the U.S. Department of Justice moved to shut down U.S. play on offshore sites in 2011—otherwise known as Black Friday.
According to onlinepokerreport.com, Ignition Casino was launched earlier this year, with games provided by Rival and Real Time Gaming, two of the biggest online casino/slots games providers in the industry. Poker software was provided by Bodog/Bovada.
That has led to speculation that the move is less an outright acquisition, but rather a transfer of assets between sister companies.
The website reported that the PR Director of BodogBrand.com, Ed Pownall contacted onlinepokerrport and said that Calvin Ayre has no connection with Bovada and that the company “is wholly owned and run by Kahnawake interests. The Bodog brand pulled out of the US market some time ago and has no business interests there.”
Bovada and Ignition players will share the same tables until October 1st.
