Type Private Founded 1999 | Website www.longitude.com | |
Industry Financial/gambling technology Key people Thomas A. Ascher, Chief Executive Officer
Scott Shechtman, Director
Joseph W. Ferraro, General Counsel Parent organization International Securities Exchange | ||
Longitude llc 4
Longitude is a technology service provider to the financial and gaming industries. First established in 1999 to enable the trading of illiquid financial products using pari-mutuel principles, Longitude expanded its focus in 2010 to pursue opportunities in the sports betting and horse race wagering industries. Longitude has developed patented single pool wagering technology for deployment throughout the US, Europe, and Asia. Longitude is a wholly owned subsidiary of International Securities Exchange Holdings, Inc. (ISE).
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Longitude llc 3
History
Longitude was founded in New York in 1999. In 2006, ISE and Goldman Sachs jointly acquired all of the Longitude assets. ISE and Goldman jointly operated the platform to conduct auctions on economic data options in partnership with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) and energy storage statistics in partnership with the New York Mercantile Exchange. In 2007, ISE purchased Goldman’s entire stake and Longitude became a wholly owned subsidiary of ISE. The Longitude platform for financial products was retired in 2007. In 2010 and 2011, the Longitude platform was reengineered to serve as a backend calculation engine for the sports betting and horse race wagering industries.
In October 2012, Britain's Sportech signed an agreement with Longitude to strengthen its football and cricket gambling and make it more attractive to a new and younger customer base. In December 2014,The Football Pools (a Sportech-owned pools and tote gaming company) announced the launch of a new pool betting opportunity in the form of MatchXtra. MatchXtra uses pools technology from Longitude LLC, to offer odds on Premier League football as well as other matches throughout the world.
In January 2014, The Hong Kong Jockey Club announced that it's adoption of the Longitude technology to support the relaunch of the Quartet bet type.
To build on the successful launch of Quartet, the Hong Kong Jockey Club launched a “power merger” of the Quartet and First Four pools on January 19, 2015. The launch resulted in a rise in turnover. The separate Quartet and First Four pools had aggregated just south of HK$50 million in turnover in the past, but some HK$67 million was wagered on the two bet types on the launch date as they shared turnover for the first time.