The Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC) and Woodbine Entertainment Group (WEG) announced an agreement enabling the commingling from Canadian customers to the Club’s pools, effective from Sunday’s (23 October) meeting at Sha Tin. The Hong Kong racing information and live broadcasting will be shown via Woodbine online and offline channels.
Live Hong Kong racing will also be shown in Canada via the Club’s cooperation with the international arm of Hong Kong's Television Broadcasts Limited (TVBI). Under this arrangement, nearly 37,000 Chinese-speaking households are enabled to watch Hong Kong racing live in Canada via TVBI's partner, Fairchild.
Welcoming the new commingling partner and broadcast arrangement, Mr. Richard Cheung, the Club’s Executive Director, Customer and Marketing said: “This is an exciting and important step to bring Hong Kong’s world-leading standard of racing and wagering excellence to Canadian audiences and customers that will result in broadening the appeal of the Hong Kong Jockey Club brand around the world.”
“This is an exciting day for horse racing fans in Canada as Hong Kong racing is very popular in this country,” said Sean Pinsonneault, WEG’s Executive Vice-President, Strategy and Wagering. “We are delighted to partner with an esteemed, forward thinking organization like the Hong Kong Jockey Club in their world-wide commingled wagering pools initiative for our valued customers in Canada. Clearly, world-wide commingled pools are the way of the future and Woodbine is pleased to be at forefront of this advance, providing our customers access to some of the largest wagering pools in the world".
In all HKJC commingling partner jurisdictions, the Club works with the host operators to facilitate mainstream live, English broadcasting of Hong Kong racing. To complement and better penetrate the Chinese population in these overseas outlets, the Club signed an agreement to enable more than 230,000 Cantonese speaking television subscribers and households in Canada, America, Australia and New Zealand to enjoy live broadcasts of Hong Kong races through the platforms of TVB International.
“The extended partnership to showcase Hong Kong’s top-class horseracing in our main strategic markets will further enhance TVBI’s portfolio of world-class programmes and appeal to a wide and diverse international audience,” said Mr. Desmond Chan, TVB’s Deputy General Manager (Legal & International Operations).
The Club now has 14 commingling partners around the world and continues to expand its reach. Turnover from commingling in the 2015/16 season increased more than 31 percent from the previous season.