IPT Rumors Confirmed: London Cancelled - IPT Sold

[memikey]

Now the women of the WPBA have nothing to worry about.

Today's paper listed 16 more terrorists arrested in England. Might not be a safe place to be anyway.

That makes the Reno tournament that much more important for the players. Now maybe $20,000 in winnings will get them their tour card for 2007. All it will take is one good tournament - either Reno or Chicago.

Jake

London is almost certainly no less safe today in respect of terrorism risks than it has been every day for at least the last 6 years and any suggestion that comes forth about terrorism being one of the significant reasons for cancellation would have not a shred of credibility.Hopefully the impending press release will clear up the purported reasons.

It may now only take one good tournament to do something Jake but this development undoubtedly overall helps the qualifiers on the money list a lot more relative to the card holders than if there were still 4 events.God forbid it should be so,but is there any good reason now not to at least have a small sliver of doubt about the Chicago event still taking place as planned?

 

[Nick B]

I have a hard time believing all this..

Can't find a suitable London venue?
- This is England not Ethiopia. No venues. Think it through. They have known for how long?

150Meg!
The value or perceived value of a business can be a little subjective...but generally goes like this:
Value or replacement value of the assets
+Value of the brand (brand recognition/brand loyalty/good will factor)
+Intellectual property (trademarks and patents etc)

So what could I replicate what KT has established? Worse case 5 Million tops.

Before someone tells me he's got all the pros locked up let me ask you this. If a competitive group offered the top 20 IPT pros 200K and the next 80, 100K (12M total) that leaves me 138Million for the rest of the enterprise. Now you have the exclusive rights to the top pros. Unfortunately you still loose your shirt.

150Million…sounds like more hype

Two surprise announcements at Reno Players meeting:

1. London Event cancelled. Reason is inability to secure the venue and/or suitable alternative location. There will be only one more event this year at Chicago. IPT tour card holders are still guaranteed a minimum of $13,000 for the three events.

2. IPT sold to Asian billionnaire Stanley Ho and Ho Interactive for approximately $150M. Kevin Trudeau has signed to continue as IPT Tour Commissioner for 5 more years.



Other items of interest:

3. Venue is the most beautiful pool center I have ever seen. Huge room with 50 perfect diamond tables with diamond overhead lighting. TV table and Grandstand area is stunning with multicolored lighting, etc.

4. IPT website will begin broadcasting EVERY match at this tournament LIVE beginning this Thursday. You have to purchase an IPT Membership ($29 annual membership plus $6 a month). This could be really good, I certainly will buy one for Chicago and Vegas tournaments.

FYI,

Oneballeddie

 

[heartworm]

Is it that different in comparison with the USA then?
Asia Businesses own half of USA's business, so get over it...

If you were living in China and had 8.5 billion dollars, you would be one piss poor example of a human being!!!! Way to many starving impoverished people over there!!!!
Purdman
Ho ain't the word for it Linda!!!

 

[BlackDragon]

So China the future of the IPT.
The chinese will get ready for it. They have the Olmpics too.
Lots of food and restaurants for everybody right now.
A side note. I like casino balls. Yellow and red and one black. I like watching snooker as the colored balls are easy to recognise on tv. Not so with the different colored fifteen ball set of 'eightballs'. It would be with just yellow and red balls though.

 

[Blackjack]

Looks like two very rich men are going to fail at the pool business, eh BlackJack? lol

Quite the contrary (btw... still waiting for your phone call) If indeed KT has "sold" the IPT to Mr. Ho, I think it is the most positive thing to happen for the IPT. That had been Kevin's plan all along, I think I have outined that in my posts. The only problem I see is contrasting business styles between West and East. If indeed Mr. Ho owns the IPT, I can guarantee you that the current staff will be slowly phased out and replaced by a staff of Mr. Ho's choosing, not Kevin's. That may or may not be a good thing. Having the IPT based in Asia is not a bad move at all. Any player that has been to Asia can tell you that the sport's popularity is off the chart in The Philippines, Taiwan, Singapore, and Japan. If solidifying the IPT as THE major tour means sacrificing venues in North America for Asian/International/Worldwide venues for the first few years, then it is well worth it IMO. Quite frankly, there is no money to made in the US and Canada.

 

[TheOne]

Can't find a suitable London venue?
- This is England not Ethiopia. No venues. Think it through. They have known for how long?

150Meg!
The value or perceived value of a business can be a little subjective...but generally goes like this:
Value or replacement value of the assets
+Value of the brand (brand recognition/brand loyalty/good will factor)
+Intellectual property (trademarks and patents etc)

So what could I replicate what KT has established? Worse case 5 Million tops.

Before someone tells me he's got all the pros locked up let me ask you this. If a competitive group offered the top 20 IPT pros 200K and the next 80, 100K (12M total) that leaves me 138Million for the rest of the enterprise. Now you have the exclusive rights to the top pros. Unfortunately you still loose your shirt.

150Million…sounds like more hype

I'm pleased you said it first, I almost fell off my chair laughing when I read that figure. Wheres the assets, the profit, the value? If there's anyone on here with a business degree please explain why this figure is ridiculous, how on earth do they value the IPT at 150m! At the moment there will be more red on the balance sheet than an embarassed tomato!

The fact that the London event has been cancelled is even more worrying. We already know (thanks to JAM) that the IPT was likely to cancel the London event BEFORE any terrorist plot was uncovered. So unless Mr Laden has joined the growing list of "blue chip" sponsors we can rule out the terror excuse. As for not finidng another venue anywhere in the WHOLE WORLD, well of course thats ridiculous also.

So it can only be cash problems. Its a lot cheaper to pay out the guaranteed $3k per player ($450k) than it is to payout the whole tournament $3m, this increases the chance that the qualifier cash will carrry the boat. As has been stated this seriously benifits the qualifiers, expect to see the guys on $15k win a card now come december, the guys who won 10k in the NA Open and have qualified again can sleep well tonight!

Will the IPT fail soon?, probably not, I certainly hope not!!! But unless they start improving their revenue streams we will probably see a reducuction in prize money sooner rather than later. BUT if another rich cue sports lover sugar daddy has been lurred in the IPT might just survive long enough to evolve into a product that can self support these exceptional tournaments and prize money!

 

[Island Drive]

Quite the contrary (btw... still waiting for your phone call) If indeed KT has "sold" the IPT to Mr. Ho, I think it is the most positive thing to happen for the IPT. That had been Kevin's plan all along, I think I have outined that in my posts. The only problem I see is contrasting business styles between West and East. If indeed Mr. Ho owns the IPT, I can guarantee you that the current staff will be slowly phased out and replaced by a staff of Mr. Ho's choosing, not Kevin's. That may or may not be a good thing. Having the IPT based in Asia is not a bad move at all. Any player that has been to Asia can tell you that the sport's popularity is off the chart in The Philippines, Taiwan, Singapore, and Japan. If solidifying the IPT as THE major tour means sacrificing venues in North America for Asian/International/Worldwide venues for the first few years, then it is well worth it IMO. Quite frankly, there is no money to made in the US and Canada.

I have said for years, it will happen overseas first before we ever get it going here in the US and lo and behold am I surprised??!!!!!!!!!! I want to thank all those in the US that have protected their towns and people from the game that is so negative in their own minds (but many have tables in their homes), and again we outsource another American iconic product.

 

[Keith Buck]

So it can only be cash problems. Its a lot cheaper to pay out the guaranteed $3k per player ($450k) than it is to payout the whole tournament $3m, this increases the chance that the qualifier cash will carrry the boat. As has been stated this seriously benifits the qualifiers, expect to see the guys on $15k win a card now come december, the guys who won 10k in the NA Open and have qualified again can sleep well tonight!

You should know better than to use an absolute statement like "So it can only be cash problems." Right off the top of my head I can think of a second possibility. There was an email just a few weeks ago that someone posted from the Excel venue saying that they were still in negotiations for the final contract. It might simply be that they couldn't get the dates they needed and couldn't come to an agreement on the contract and changing to another venue with the space and time requirements only a month before the tournament would seem to me to be an impossible task.

I tend to agree that the IPT selling for $150 million sounds unlikely and it seems more reasonable to believe that someone might have committed that amount to the IPT with a percentage of it going to KT for "goodwill" and any assets that the business has.

 

[TheOne]

You should know better than to use an absolute statement like "So it can only be cash problems." Right off the top of my head I can think of a second possibility. There was an email just a few weeks ago that someone posted from the Excel venue saying that they were still in negotiations for the final contract. It might simply be that they couldn't get the dates they needed and couldn't come to an agreement on the contract and changing to another venue with the space and time requirements only a month before the tournament would seem to me to be an impossible task.

I tend to agree that the IPT selling for $150 million sounds unlikely and it seems more reasonable to believe that someone might have committed that amount to the IPT with a percentage of it going to KT for "goodwill" and any assets that the business has.

Its my opinion, which isn't fact, well not always!

They've been planning these events for a year, if they couldn't come to an agreement for the excel then there's a whole host of other venues in the UK, America and yes the rest of the world. I am basing my opinion on the following events that have happened to date:

- The IPT postoned the original dates by 6 months so they could hold the qualifiers first.
- The IPT swiched the events around holding the open/qualifier events first.
- The IPT states they expect 64 players at each qualifier but the numbers are much lower.
- The IPT increased the advertised entry to the world open qualifier and cancelled challenge matches and other bonuses.
- The IPT cancelled the $1k end of year qualifier option as clearly stated on one of KT's audio announcements, only 2k option now.
- Number of end of year qualifiers increased from 50 to 200 increasing number of world wide qualifier events to 100.
- Eurosport drops live coverage of World Open (I bought sky for this! grrr)
- IPT cancels one of only two events that doesn't have qualifiers.

We of course don't know what the real reason is but I hope you can see how it looks?

 

[sniper]

Hopefully Mr.Ho's involvement with the IPT will bring more involvement with the Asian players, if the IPT wants to truly have the best players in the world it is gonna have to have the best players from Asia, this would truly change the face of the IPT.

 

[jjinfla]

Back around 1972 I worked in Chicago for RCA Computers. They had schools in Cherry Hill New Jersey, West Palm Beach, Van Nuys California. Factories in WPB and VN. i was lucky enough to get to go to all of them. RCA tried to compete with big Blue. Couldn't do it. One day we heard they sold the business to Univac. It sure didn't take long for everything to dissappear.

One thing for sure, when the IPT is sold all the plans that KT had can be changed at a moments notice.

What I really don't understand is just what is it that KT sold? Right now he has all of the best players coming to play in his tournaments for one reason only - he is offering them a chance to make a lot of money. Surely Ho could have done the same thing for a lot less than 150 million. But then the early rumors, months ago, placed the price closer to 50 million. Still a heck of a lot of money.

What the hell, I am sure that Thorsten, Manalo, Bustamante, Reyes, etel, are enjoying themselves and are laughing all the way to the bank.

At the end of this week there will still be a lot of happy pool players making that trip to the bank.

Now we can all speculate as to whether the Chicago Tournament will take place.

Jake

 

[sjm]

What I really don't understand is just what is it that KT sold? Right now he has all of the best players coming to play in his tournaments for one reason only - he is offering them a chance to make a lot of money.

The same question occurred to me, Jake. It's not as if KT wons exclusive rights to the players.

Great story about RCA, too. As you note, change the management team and all bets are off. I've endured three corporate mergers myself, so I can relate.

Those points aside, though, the better part of me feels that adding Asian proprietors to the IPT is a good thing. Asia's passion for pool is uncontestable, and the depth of the Asian talent pool in our sport is most impressive.

If moving our sport to Asia will make it grow, it is a price worth paying. I'm sure more information is coming regarding this, so it's porobably best to reserve judgment here.

 

[sjm]

Elimination of the London event, reducing the IPT 2006 Schedule to three events, means that Ronnie O'Sullivan's no-show in Reno is far more likely to cost him his IPT tour card than before.

 

[memikey]

You should know better than to use an absolute statement like "So it can only be cash problems." Right off the top of my head I can think of a second possibility. There was an email just a few weeks ago that someone posted from the Excel venue saying that they were still in negotiations for the final contract. It might simply be that they couldn't get the dates they needed and couldn't come to an agreement on the contract and changing to another venue with the space and time requirements only a month before the tournament would seem to me to be an impossible task.

I tend to agree that the IPT selling for $150 million sounds unlikely and it seems more reasonable to believe that someone might have committed that amount to the IPT with a percentage of it going to KT for "goodwill" and any assets that the business has.

Would agree with you that there obviously could be reasons other than what TheOne has homed in on but most realistic people can also see where TheOne is coming from on this.

As regards the venue availability here are the published contracted bookings of The London Excel for the period during which the IPT event was supposed to be taking place (22-29 Oct) plus the 5 day period before the IPT event,during which time presumably IPT may have required some space to set up etc:-

17-18 Oct.....Symbian Smartphone Show

27-29 Oct..... Homes Overseas Magazine Exhibition

28-29 Oct..... London MCM Expo

Absolutely nothing booked during the period 19-27 Oct and even on 17-18 Oct and 27-29 Oct only very small events that would not occupy more than a small fraction of the enormous London Excel venue.Far from this being a case of The London Excel unable to accommodate IPT it looks to the casual outsider much more like IPT inconveniencing The London Excel by waiting until the last minute to cancel a provisional booking or 'intent to book' that they had held for months.

The REEEAAALLLLY cynical people on this site and elsewhere could be excused for allowing the passing thought to cross their mind whether in fact IPT ever even had any serious intention whatsoever from the beginning of holding this particular event or whether it was always provisional in their mind and subject to reassessment nearer the scheduled event time in accordance with how their other plans were shaping up at that time.

 

[Keith Buck]

Would agree with you that there obviously could be reasons other than what TheOne has homed in on but most realistic people can also see where TheOne is coming from on this.

As regards the venue availability here are the published contracted bookings of The London Excel for the period during which the IPT event was supposed to be taking place (22-29 Oct) plus the 5 day period before the IPT event,during which time presumably IPT may have required some space to set up etc:-

17-18 Oct.....Symbian Smartphone Show

27-29 Oct..... Homes Overseas Magazine Exhibition

28-29 Oct..... London MCM Expo

Absolutely nothing booked during the period 19-27 Oct and even on 17-18 Oct and 27-29 Oct only very small events that would not occupy more than a small fraction of the enormous London Excel venue.Far from this being a case of The London Excel unable to accommodate IPT it looks to the casual outsider much more like IPT inconveniencing The London Excel by waiting until the last minute to cancel a provisional booking or 'intent to book' that they had held for months.

The REEEAAALLLLY cynical people on this site and elsewhere could be excused for allowing the passing thought to cross their mind whether in fact IPT ever even had any serious intention whatsoever from the beginning of holding this particular event or whether it was always provisional in their mind and subject to reassessment nearer the scheduled event time in accordance with how their other plans were shaping up at that time.

I really had no problem with Craig's line of thinking that it might be cash problems, my main point was with his statement that it could only be cash problems.

Another possibility could be that they had trouble finding enough Diamond tables that were available in the UK and they discovered that shipping the tables to the venue was going to take longer or be more difficult to organize than they expected.

There are many possible reasons for the cancellation and a cash shortage is definately one of them but not the only one.

 

[memikey]

I really had no problem with Craig's line of thinking that it might be cash problems, my main point was with his statement that it could only be cash problems.....

Fully agree and that was fully understood,hence the paragraph I opened my post with

 

[TheOne]

I really had no problem with Craig's line of thinking that it might be cash problems, my main point was with his statement that it could only be cash problems.

Another possibility could be that they had trouble finding enough Diamond tables that were available in the UK and they discovered that shipping the tables to the venue was going to take longer or be more difficult to organize than they expected.

There are many possible reasons for the cancellation and a cash shortage is definately one of them but not the only one.

OK sure have to conceed that there ARE (and I hope!) other reasons, just doesnt look good at the moment. I have to give KT his due though, Im certainly learnings heaps of stuff from the way he is putting this thing together, his audio tapes were very clever. In true political style he creates "smoke screens" at the right time, we need to pull and event, lets announce a $150m takeover and new sponsor! I'm not knocking him btw I think he's doing a great job, very cunning.

PS
The venue excuse, although extreemly implausible was much better than not being able to ship a few tables over

On a plus note, lots of improvements on the website, it really has reached an excellent standard now with lots of stats and functionality. I see they are attempting to keep us updated with live updates, although I still wish we could view a single page with all the match scores on so we can simply refresh that and not scroll through 20 pages.

 

[shortshooter]

I would also like to know whether the tour has been sold or ether $150million has been invested by Mr HO. As someone said earlier they two totally different things.

The only good factor in my opinion is that the tour will continue to run. Being a Brit I am also disappointed about the London event and would like to see a press release with clear answers.

Anyway come on the Brits in Reno!

Hi Pete.

This is a quote from an email I received from the IPT, and in my book "aquired" means "Sold"

Finally, Trudeau announced that the IPT has entered into an agreement to be acquired by Ho Interactive, a new company started by casino owner billionaire Stanley Ho, who also owns online gambling site www.hocasino.com.
Trudeau said that Ho Interactive will be taken public on the London exchange at some point in the near future.

 

[Buckster_uk]

With regards to the IPT London cancellation, we received a post on Pro9 from someone who is out in Reno who chatted to Kevin, apparently the main problem was contract problems with the venue in London, along with getting the tables through customs with the current high security situation.

 

[Nick B]

Dont' sweat it

All bets are off. This guy will probably not maintain KT crazy format. Nor will O'Sullivan pass on snooker for a series/association that doesn't deliver. He's not Quinten Hann without professional options.

I feel sorry with all the players who had stars in their eyes or believed in this Kamikaze business style. Regardless of this sugar daddies deep pockets I’m not betting he will throw around disproportionate payouts. The kids would come out to play for half the money.

Nick

Cant't get the tables in due to security...funny. They seem to have no problem letting these guys and their toys through:
http://www.formula1.com/race/circuitdetail/758.html

Elimination of the London event, reducing the IPT 2006 Schedule to three events, means that Ronnie O'Sullivan's no-show in Reno is far more likely to cost him his IPT tour card than before.