Ontario Teacher's Pension Fund Buys UK National Lottery

The UK National Lottery has a new owner. Recent news reports say that the popular national lottery has been purchased from current operator Camelot by the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan from Canada. The UK National Lottery Commission will have to approve the deal before it can be completed. Reports say the deal is worth C$590 (385,418,680 pounds or $573,321,862 USD) Camelot executive Dianne Thompson stated, "We welcome Teachers' commitment to The National Lottery's ongoing success, and look forward to the opportunity of working with them to continue our progress in developing the business and delivering even more money for the good causes." Current operator Camelot said that the company's shareholders Cadbury Holdings, De La Rue Holdings, Fujitsu Services, Royal Mail Enterprises and Thales Electronics have agreed to the sale. The Ontario Teacher's Pension Plan is known as "Teacher's."

Teacher's also has several other holdings in the UK including Acorn Care and Education, Bristol International Airport, Birmingham Airport, Scotia Gas Networks, InterGen and Thomas More Square Estate. Camelot, which currently manages the UK National Lottery designs new lottery games and markets lottery products and also rune the vast lottery ticket network. The UK national Lottery will undoubtedly be a lucrative investment for the Teacher's Pension Plan and Camelot reported 5.15 pounds in sales for the fiscal year ending March 2009. (about $7 and a half billion USD) Teacher's is one of the world's biggest private investors with assets estimated at $87.4 billion dollars.

The National Lottery enjoys immense popularity with both UK players and European players. The UK national Lottery sells online lottery tickets for the convenience of players and sales have been brisk. Camelot Group will continue to run the lottery and work with Teacher's to provide players with the best lottery service possible. Teacher's executive Lee Sienna stated, "Camelot is a world-class lottery business with substantial opportunities to grow, both domestically and internationally." Sienna also praised Camelot's previous charity work saying, "We maintain the highest standards in relation to management and governance, which we see as particularly important in the case of Camelot, given its unique role in raising money for the good causes."

In the UK and Europe most lotteries are using the latest software to offer online lottery tickets in addition to traditional lottery tickets. In the US most lotteries have yet to adopt modern technology but two states, Illinois and Iowa, are researching the possibility of offering players online lottery tickets. The technology is already in place and US lotteries need look no further than the UK National Lottery to see how a highly successful online lottery ticket sales network can be easily implemented.