Gambling magnate Chandler signs up for TV greyhound racing joint venture

Gaming insight has landed one of the most high-profile names in the bookmaking industry in a move aimed at securing the future of its GoBarkingMad digital TV greyhound racing channel.

Victor Chandler, the Gibraltar-based gaming magnate, has stepped in to create a joint venture with Gaming Insight to extend the scope of its greyhound racing offering. Mr Chandler, who runs the online betting group Victor Chandler International, is to join the Gaming Insight board as a non-executive director. It is his first public company directorship.

The new company will be called Red Bet Racing and will use Mr Chandler's existing betting infrastructure to provide pari-mutuel, telephone and interactive fixed odds betting on greyhound racing. The product will also be marketed to Mr Chandler's customers.

GoBarkingMad, which was launched last year on BSkyB, is to be rebranded Red Button Racing later this month.

The channel will retain the GoBarkingMad name as the title of its main programme.

Gaming Insight also revealed that it had raised £2m by placing 200,000 new shares. David Sanderson, the chief executive, said the money raising completed the company's original target of raising £12m when it listed on the Alternative Investment Market 18 months ago. At the time, it raised just £8m, but returned to the market last October to raise a further £2m.

Mr Sanderson said he could not rule out the need to raise further funds from the stock market. "It all depends on the performance of the business but we obviously don't discount that," he said. Mr Chandler said he was "extremely excited" about the joint venture. "The growth in the greyhound market through multiple delivery channels now makes it possible to fully exploit the true potential and enable Red Bet racing to gain a leadership position."

Gaming Insight also announced the appointment of David Warren as a non-executive director. It added that Mr Warren, who along with Mr Chandler has been granted 50,000 warrants to subscribe for new shares in Gaming Insight at the placing price, was described as an "active corporate investor".