It is odd that Yahoo's stake of the fantasy sports market constantly goes unmentioned while daily fantasy startups like Draft Kings is currently bathing in VC cash and media coverage.
> daily fantasy startups like Draft Kings is currently bathing in VC cash and media coverage.
They're currently bathing in legal battles and will probably be out of business in very short order. It's a liability for Yahoo, not an asset to brag about.
That depends. I thought the same thing would happen to Uber, but they've used their rapid growth and VC money to fund lobbying efforts to change the laws around taxi regulation. As I understand it, these FF startups are attempting to exploit similar loopholes in Internet gambling laws as a short-term fix while they lobby to change the law in their favor.
Uber was never declared illegal gambling by multiple US attorney generals. They fight corrupt local politics, not well tested gambling laws. The only reason the execs aren't in jail already is because they have very well connected investors (which helps Uber as well!).
Yahoo is in the business of running fantasy football: a service which adds up points and tell you whose team wins.
Draft Kings is in the business of running a fantasy-inspired gambling scheme: people pay them money, and some fraction returns to the guy with the most fantasy points.
Market share isn't comparable here; only one of these is an actual profit center. (I have no strong opinions on the viability of DraftKings/FanDuel, but they are plausible moneymakers on their own, Yahoo or ESPN fantasy aren't, other than as a source of ad eyeballs.)
You know, that is strange. Yahoo has a much much larger share of the traditional fantasy market, as well as a daily fantasy product. Not sure how the money aspect of it compares with FanDuel or DraftKings, but you would think they'd be able to leverage that in some way. Maybe a smaller spinoff company would be more likely to do something with that
That's the point I was trying to make. Yahoo has first mover advantage in having their own infrastructure for calculating scores and player statistics, not to mention a large base of users. Surely their fantasy sports products would be of value to companies looking to get a piece of the online sports gambling industry?
