PokerShare Suing Ultimate Bet and Excapsa

Online poker room, PokerShare.com, has filed suit against UltimateBet.com and its network partner, Excapsa, to the tune of £100 million, citing that actions the two parties took forced PokerShare out of business.

PokerShare.com opened in August 2005 as a novel concept, one where through their play, players would actually own a piece of the company. Dividends would be distributed quarterly, and if the poker room were ever to go public, which it had planned on doing, those with pieces of the company would also be granted stock.

Problems started within just a couple months, as PokerShare started drawing players away from Ultimate Bet. Because the two were on the same poker network, Excapsa, customers felt comfortable moving from the established Ultimate Bet to the fledgling PokerShare, as the look, feel, and traffic would be the same. But now, they’d be earning share points in addition to any other bonuses and winnings.

This did not sit well with Ultimate Bet, as it was the big dog in the network. It was the poker room that controlled Excapsa’s North American market, and now PokerShare was intruding. Excapsa made the sudden and surprising move to not allow Americans to patron PokerShare. Shortly thereafter, the network stopped supporting it’s young poker room altogether, forcing PokerShare to shutdown in November.

PokerShare contends that because Excapsa cut off the rights to its poker platform and support, it had to cease operations.

This couldn’t come at a worse time for Excapsa and Ultimate Bet. They have been considering going public on the London Stock Exchange, like several of their competitors have already done. A lawsuit for half of the estimated float would not be good. Excapsa could probably survive the suit, but it would probably limp into the float. Even if it came out the other side in good shape financially, the public relations impact would most definitely be negative. Internet poker players are a fickle group – who knows what sort of impact a hit on its image would have for the network and Ultimate Bet.

Originally published January 20, 2006