Ryanair in-flight gambling entertainment on the cards

07.11.2005

Some months back, it was reported on speculation that Ryanair had plans to introduce online gambling to its in-flight entertainment offerings, but unfortunately we were unable to follow up on the story when the budget airline ignored our questions.

This week, it appears that the airline is now ready to talk, with several articles appearing in mainstream as well as online gambling media.

The announcement came from no less than the founder of Ryanair, Michael O'Leary, and he revealed that there were plans to introduce in-flight gambling by 2007 which may prompt it to offer free tickets if successful.

According to O'Leary, Ryanair plans to launch a gambling service in the next 12 to 18 months with a payment system that would allow it to debit a passenger's credit card before the plane lands. Passengers would be able gamble using the mobile phones supplied by the airlines.

O'Leary is looking to team up with a few online gaming operators for this initiative in the next two to three months, he says. The trials are expected to be launched by the summer of 2006 summer, and if even 25 to 30 percent of passengers enjoyed this service, he predicted a rise in revenues worth GBP 50 million.

Currently, services including car hire, hotels, travel insurance and in-flight sales make up for about 20 per cent of Ireland based- Ryanair's GBP 950 million turnover, O'Leatry revealed. It also accounted for 16 percent of the companys GBP 200 million annual profits. Mr O'Leary foresaw rise in non-ticket revenues with introduction of more in-flight entertainment.