DraftKings, an American Daily Fantasy Sports Contest and Sports Betting Provider, has announced that it has entered into a multi-year deal with Casino Queen in terms of which the provider will operate a retail Sports Book and Mobile App in the Prairie State.
The agreement between the parties follows the launch of Online Sports Betting in Illinois two weeks ago and sees DraftKings avoiding an 18 month delay to enter the market in Illinois.
Only sports books in brick-and-mortar casinos were given the ‘go ahead’ to operate when sports betting was launched by the state in March 2020, which left online-only companies 540 days behind.
Illinois has the sixth-largest population in the country and is the third-largest city with five professional sports teams across the four major leagues and could follow Colorado in becoming a hot market very quickly.
Governor J.B. Pritzker suspended mandatory in-person registration in early June, resulting in the sports betting landscape in Illinois changing significantly. The suspension was due to the COVID-19 crisis, giving residents the opportunity to register directly from mobile devices or computers.
Pritzker’s suspension of in-person registration is due to play an important role in getting its mobile app off the ground and it will be interesting to see whether or not the state will ever go back to in-person registration.
If DraftKing manages to launch in Illinois by mid-July, it will have a chance to plant itself in the state just before the return of the National Basketball Association and the Major League Baseball.