Update on William Hill Australia

Update on William Hill Australia

16 July 2014

William Hill PLC (LSE: WMH) (William Hill or the Group), one of the world's leading betting and gaming companies, announces the appointment of Tom Waterhouse as Chief Executive Officer of William Hill Australia, the Group's Australian operations which encompass the Sportingbet and Centrebet brands as well as tomwaterhouse.com.

William Hill also announces the early settlement of the Tom Waterhouse N.T. pty Limited (tomwaterhouse.com) earn-out for A$5m (£2.8m) in cash. This compares to an earn-out potential valued at $1m at the end of 2013. The difference will be treated as an exceptional non-recurring cost in 2014. The Group acquired tomwaterhouse.com in August 2013 for A$35m (£20.5m) plus the earn-out, now settled, of up to A$70m based on the incremental operating profit of the business in the year to 31 December 2015. Settling the earn-out ahead of schedule further improves William Hill Australia's operational and fiscal flexibility following the successful systems integration of tomwaterhouse.com into William Hill Australia in April 2014.There will be a further £1.8m exceptional item in the first half of 2014 linked to the restructuring of the William Hill Australia management team in that period.

This announcement is being made pursuant to LR 11.1.10 R, given the related party status of Tom Waterhouse.

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About William Hill

William Hill, The Home of Betting, is one of the world's leading betting and gaming companies, employing more than 17,000 people. Founded in 1934, it is now the UK's largest bookmaker with around 2,430 licensed betting offices that provide betting opportunities on a wide range of sporting and non-sporting events, gaming on machines and numbers-based products including lotteries. The Group's Online business (www.williamhill.com) is one of world's leading online betting and gaming businesses, providing customers with the opportunity to access William Hill's products online, through their smartphone or tablet, by telephone and by text services. William Hill US was established in June 2012 and provides land-based and mobile sports betting services in Nevada, and is the exclusive risk manager for the State of Delaware's sports lottery. William Hill Australia is one of the largest online betting businesses in Australia after the Group acquired the Sportingbet Australia business in March 2013 and tomwaterhouse.com in August 2013, two of the leading online corporate bookmakers in Australia, offering sports betting products online, by telephone and via mobile devices. William Hill PLC has been listed on the London Stock Exchange since 2002. The Group generates revenues of c£1.5bn a year.

About tomwaterhouse.com

tomwaterhouse.com was established in 2010 and is one of Australia's fastest growing online racing and sports betting businesses. Prior to the business being acquired by William Hill, it was owned by members of the Waterhouse family. The Waterhouse name has been synonymous with betting and racing in Australia for more than a century. Tom Waterhouse himself is a fourth-generation bookmaker. Prior to launching his online racing and sports betting business, Tom was Australia's biggest on-course bookmaker.