Group Chief Executive Officer, IG Group Holdings plc
Dublin Web Summit - Breon Corcoran
'Ireland can be a global e-commerce hub' says Paddy Power's chief operations officer Breon Corcoran For more information visit ...
About Breon Corcoran
Breon Corcoran, Group Chief Executive Officer at Ig Holdings, has spoken about the relationship between betting exchanges and horse racing. In a 2021 address, he noted that Betfair, where he previously served, was the first online operator to voluntarily sign a commercial deal with British racing, committing to a minimum of £40 million over five years. He stated that in the company's early years, approximately 70% of its revenues came from horse racing, a figure that decreased over time amid overall business growth. Corcoran described the betting exchange as a trading product that offers customers incremental value after they place bets, and he characterized the relationship between wagering and racing as mutually beneficial. In a 2011 appearance, Corcoran, then chief operations officer at Paddy Power, discussed Ireland's potential as a global e-commerce hub. He said that the government needed to recognize the value of quality employment in the sector and that traditional thinking about funding smaller industries, such as horse racing, through taxes on global businesses was not necessarily conducive to attracting top firms. He also observed that Ireland had two economies—a domestic economy and outward-facing businesses—and expressed hope that companies targeting a global market could drive job creation.
Transcript (10 segments)
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Interviewer0:13
Breon, you're the Chief Operations Officer of Paddy Power. Paddy Power, in my mind, is probably one of our truest examples of a homegrown success story in the e-commerce world. You see Paddy Power stores all around the country, but the online story has been just phenomenal in terms of numbers and the kind of things you're doing as well in terms of apps. Tell me a bit about the e-commerce journey for Paddy Power and just where you see the internet in terms of how you do what you do.
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Breon Corcoran0:39
Thanks, John. So the Paddy Power business is 22 years old and is one of the best recognised brands in the country. The internet story at Paddy Power began by the desire and the appetite and the energy of the founders, the founding management team, back in 1999. And ten or eleven years later, it's now a business of some scale. So 80% of our operating profit comes from the internet, and in 2010 we had revenues of just about €250 million. This business continues to be managed from a nondescript office in Tallaght, where we've built a certain capability in one of the toughest online industries in the world. And we've done that by hiring good people and developing our own, and bringing in the best people we can find from wherever they are, provided they're prepared to come to move to Dublin.
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Interviewer1:24
That's the thing. I mean, you guys announced 250 jobs at a time when we've got 400,000 people unemployed. Getting those kind of skilled people, making sure Irish people themselves know that they can actually qualify for these jobs — what's needed?
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Breon Corcoran1:38
So I think it's more incumbent on us than ever at Paddy Power to go out and tell our story. I think if anything we have underplayed the capability and the technology capability and the technology appetite that we have as a company and why we have been focused on growing our business abroad, particularly in the UK where most of our customers are, and in Australia where we've bought two businesses in the last year. We haven't focused as much as perhaps we should on growing a talent pool in Ireland, growing a talent pipeline. So we are delighted to work with the broader e-commerce community and share some of our expertise and some of the capabilities we've developed in terms of SEO and PPC to try and help other smaller businesses in Ireland — the quid pro quo being that there'll be a greater awareness of what we're doing and ultimately, hopefully, a better facility for us building our team.
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Interviewer2:29
The building of the team — I mean, you guys, as I said, you're kind of fearless when it comes to new technologies. You look into all the apps side of things and digital television. But where do you think it's all going, and what kind of lesson can the rest of the country learn from what you've applied?
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Breon Corcoran2:45
So we try to be very focused. We don't ever presume that we are smart enough to know where the world will go, but we want to be current with what's going on at any point in time. So we've actually had mobile web applications going back nine years, but in the last 12 months, since in particular the launch of the iPhone, we've just seen a transformational change there. So now, year to date at the end of February, 31% of our internet customers were transacting for cash on mobile. So that wave is now playing out, and while we can't presume to know exactly where it brings us, we've tried to be in the right place at the right time — neither too early and wrong nor too late to catch up. And when we get something right, we try to refine and focus it as best we can. Focus on what works, focus on the key, and then drive performance from there.
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Interviewer3:34
Ireland — you know, our businesses in general haven't really grasped e-commerce. A statistic I see, and I've said it again and again, is that of firms that have the web, only 21% of them actually have e-commerce transaction capabilities. What should we do to change this situation, and do you believe it's actually imperative that we get companies trading this way?
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Breon Corcoran3:57
Well, it does feel like the moment that there's two Irelands, there's two economies in Ireland. There's the domestic economy and there's the outward-facing businesses. The hope that I'm hearing, and there's a considerable amount of it around at the minute, is from companies that are trying to target a more global market. Now, in our industry, it happens that we're in quite a regulated space, but we realised early that an island of five million people wasn't a deep enough opportunity for us to target. So from almost day one, we were focused on international growth. I think people have to realise that the time is now — in fact, the time has passed — for people to start this journey towards transaction e-commerce. But it's also doable and an attainable goal, and people just have to grasp the nettle and get started. And then the willingness of other people to share expertise and the appetite of the broader community to help you learn is such that traction can be got and progress can be made.
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Interviewer4:59
I think it's a wonderful thing that Paddy Power is able to create all the jobs it's creating here in Ireland, and if some of those skills have to be brought in, so be it. But the ability into the future — there's been a lot of talk of creating an online gaming industry in Ireland, and we have had some success, not only with you guys but a number of other companies have come in. There's been talk of changing the gaming acts and laws to basically make Ireland more attractive for these companies. Some of the figures I've heard are that 8,000 jobs could be created in one fell swoop if we changed our gambling legislation. How likely is this to happen, do you think? Do you think the new government will grasp the nettle?
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Breon Corcoran5:42
So I think there's a sufficient cluster now of talent in Ireland that we can credibly position ourselves as a hub for e-commerce, both in the gaming industry and in the gambling and betting industry. And as you said, we've already had some success in getting operations set up here. I think the government generally needs to realise that some investment is required and that a thoughtful approach to cultivating this smart economy — and critically, this is quality employment — is needed. Therefore, thinking perhaps excessively traditionally about the funding of smaller industries such as the horse racing industry and levying taxes against global businesses to do that isn't necessarily conducive to attracting top-quality firms here. But there is an increased awareness as to the value of this employment, there's an increased awareness as to the ability to compete from Ireland, but we just need to be sure that short-term tax gains and short-term levies against certain industries to the advantage of others is thought about in the broadest possible way, so that we can really seize the opportunities out there.