William Hill plc is a bookmaker based in London, England. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. The company was founded by William Hill in 1934 at a time when gambling was illegal in Britain. It changed hands many times, being acquired by Sears Holdings in 1971,then by Grand Metropolitan in 1988, then by Brent Walker in 1989. In September 1996, Brent Walker recouped £117m of the £685m it had paid for William Hill when Grand Metropolitan were found to have exaggerated the company's profits at the time of the sale. Japanese investment bank Nomura mounted a £700m leveraged buyout of William Hill in 1997, when Brent Walker collapsed with debts exceeding £1.3bn after an investigation by the Serious Fraud Office which saw two directors given prison sentences. In February 1999, a proposed stock market flotation was abandoned due to "weak interest"and Nomura offloaded the company to funds managed by private equity firms Cinven and CVC Capital Partners for £825m instead.The company was eventually listed on the London Stock Exchange in 2002.The following year Chief Executive David Harding was awarded a £2.84m bonus, making him the UK's fifth highest paid company director in 2003.It acquired Sunderland Greyhound Stadium in 2002 and Newcastle Greyhound Stadium in 2003. In June 2004, Chief Executive David Harding sold £5.2m of shares to fund his divorce, precipitating a decline in the company's stock that wiped £75m off the value of the company. In 2005, William Hill bought 624 betting offices in the UK, Republic of Ireland, Isle of Man and Jersey from Stanley Leisure for £504 million: the acquisition briefly took the company past Ladbrokes into first position in the UK betting market in terms of shops but not revenue. The Office of Fair Trading made William Hill sell 78 of the 624 Stanley shops due to concerns over anti-competitive practices. Amidst fears that William Hill had overpaid for the Stanley shops, the company was relegated from the FTSE 100 Index in December 2005. In 2008, Ralph Topping was appointed Chief Executive. After having dropped out of Strathclyde University as a self-confessed 'rascal', Topping had taken a Saturday job at a William Hill betting shop near Hampden Park, Glasgow, in 1973 and worked his way up through the ranks. In November 2008, William Hill went into partnership with Orbis (latterly OpenBet), and Israeli software company Playtech, to remedy its own failing online operation. Under the terms of the deal, William Hill paid Playtech's founder Teddy Sagi £144.5m for various assets and affiliate companies. These included several online casino sites which William Hill continues to run under the name WHG. Playtech took a 29% stake in the new William Hill Online entity. The company wrote-off a reported £26m when scrapping their previous in-house system. In June 2009 William Hill backed Playtech despite their partner having a quarter of its stock market value wiped out following a profits warning.In 2012 William Hill acquired three small sportsbook operators in Nevada, which at the time was the only state to offer full service sports betting. Following a Supreme Court ruling in 2017 the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act was declared unconstitutional, meaning individual states could decide whether to offer sports betting or not. Since that ruling over 17 states have passed regulations to enable sports betting and William Hill has established the biggest reach of any operator and is the biggest operator in the US.The company operates worldwide, employing approximately 14,000 people with main offices in the UK, Republic of Ireland and Gibraltar, offering betting by phone and Internet together with their 1,568 UK-wide Licensed Betting Offices. Its telebetting call centres, which are located in Rotherham, South Yorkshire took 125,000 bets on the 2007, Grand National and according to the company its betting shops process more than one million betting slips on an average day. In addition to its online sportsbook operations, the company offers online casino games, 'skill games', online bingo and online poker. Since the Gambling Act 2005, gaming machines have strengthened profits to counteract falling revenues in other areas. In August 2010, William Hill launched a training programme for its 10,000+ workforce to combat underage gambling in its retail outlets. In November 2008, analysts at UBS noted "concern" at the company's level of debt, which stood at over £1bn and was later reported as £1.5bn. In 2009 the company enacted both a rights issue and a corporate bond issue, in an effort to restructure its debt.The company operates 2,300 betting shops.On August 3, 2020, the bookmaker opened the first full-service betting operation housing professional sports teams in the U.S. at Capitol One Arena in Washington D.C. In August 2020, as a result of the economic effects caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the company announced that it will close 119 shops permanently. Despite that, only 16 employees will lose their job positions, while the others will be assigned to new positions. It also announced that the firm will be merging its retail and online operations. William Hill is one of the most well known and loved High street bookmakers and has been serving the needs of punters since 1934. Catering for a massive range of bets from polo to politics, they have you covered. We have been the beneficiary of the great ‘Bore draw insurance’ on more than one occasion and if you’re ‘on the go’ then the William Hill mobile app is your perfect companion. A great looking website backed up with fantastic customer support that is available 24 hours a day. Without any doubt, the uniquely wide range of betting options is their most remarkable attribute. The impressive list of sportsbook features also includes Live betting and streaming console, Tip Advisor, News/Blogs section and many more. Additionally, place a £10 and William Hill will give you 3 x £10 bets to use how you choose.
William Hill is unique gambling company thats operating in the world sports market.It is perfect combination of sport, bingo, casino, poker and many other.This online betting platform is very powerful and a lot of people wants to use it all over the world.