According to the Sunday Times, JKO Play has gained financial support for its ongoing bid to acquire Playtech, with the Eddie Jordan-led group reportedly receiving cash from Vikrant Bhargava. 

Bhargava is said to have pledged to co-financing a potential acquisition, for which JKO Play obtained an extension of the deadline last week to solidify its interests.

JKO Play secures extension to acquire Playtech 

Bhargava, a British businessman of Indian origin, previously co-founded and served as marketing director of PartyGaming, which merged with Bwin Interactive Entertainment to establish Bwin. Party in 2011.

As previously stated, JKO Play was given an extended deadline last week to announce a firm intention to offer Playtech or withdraw its acquisitive ambitions, following Playtech’s adjournment of a shareholder meeting to accept Aristocrat’s £2.7 billion acquisition.

JKO Play got an extension to the date initially set at 5 pm on January 5, 2022, following confirmation that its shareholder meetings to ratify Aristocrat’s £2.7 billion offer would be adjourned to February 2, 2022. As a result of the adjournment, the UK’s Takeover Panel has determined that the company now has until 5 p.m. on January 26, 2022, the seventh day before the adjourned shareholder meetings, to announce a formal intention make an offer or to tell that it will not.

Aristocrat still the frontrunner 

This deadline will be waived if a third company other than JKO announces a firm intention to offer Playtech before that date. However, Aristocrat has continuously remained the frontrunner to secure any potential purchase with its October 2020 offer of £2.7 billion, or 680 pence per share, a 58 percent premium to the previous week’s closing price.

Aristocrat has stated that if it successfully acquired the company, it intends to use its new Snaitech subsidiary to ‘operate and innovate’ in Europe while increasing its income, expanding its client reach, and providing meaningful scale in online gaming.

If JKO does not pursue its initial acquisition interests, the Aristocrat transaction will close in the second quarter of 2022.