Major UK bookmaker William Hill is set to promote its Interim CEO Philip Bowcock into a permanent Chief Executive, The Financial Times reported earlier today. Mr. Bowcock assumed the Interim CEO post last summer after the company’s former head – James Henderson – was ousted following the publication of a profit warning in March 2016.
Mr. Bowcock joined the gambling operator in late 2015 as its Chief Financial Officer. Prior to that, he had served as CFO of cinema operator Cineworld Group Plc and had occupied different financial roles at Luminar Group Holdings PLC, Tesco PLC, and Hilton Group plc, among many others.
According to The Financial Times, William Hill is set to announce the appointment of Mr. Bowcock as permanent CEO on Friday, when the company is set to report its full-year results for 2016.
It has been a bit of a tumultuous time for William Hill as the company has been striving to improve its profitability after last year’s profit warning. It was last spring when the operator informed shareholders and the media that it had to lower its initial profit expectations for the full year due to poor Cheltenham results and underperforming digital division.
In July, the company announced that its then CEO, James Henderson, would leave after two years at the helm and more than three decades at William Hill. The operator has since then been looking for a permanent CEO, with Mr. Bowcock serving as an Interim Chief Executive. Word has leaked out that GVC Holdings CEO Kenneth Alexander has been among the people eyed by William Hill’s Board for the vacated post.
As it seems, the bookmaker, one of UK’s and the world’s largest, has opted for an internal move instead. The appointment of Mr. Bowcock may be coming as a surprise to many, mainly due to his lack of significant experience in the gambling industry, particularly when compared to an industry veteran like Mr. Henderson. However, it is yet to be seen whether the company’s new CEO will succeed in repairing the damage done.
It has recently been reported that William Hill’s largest shareholder – hedge fund Parvus Asset Management – is ready to support the sale of the operator to an online gambling business. The British bookmaker’s name was involved in two merger and acquisition deals last year but both failed to be realized.
The failure of the possible William Hill-Amaya merger was attributed namely to Parvus and the pressure it put to the operator’s board, arguing that a deal with the Canadian gambling group that owns online poker room PokerStars would not be in the best interest of the UK company and its shareholders.
