NetPlay TV plc has incresed revenues more than 280% in the first half of 2008, with a gross profit of £3 million. However, the company made a loss for the period due to higher management costs and investment required to restructure the business. The star products for the firm were the Supercasino.com brand and its Live Roulette. They also bought Bingos.com in April.

NetPlay have developed various games for its Live Roulette website, with bets on roulette topping one and a half million pounds a month. There are over 24,000 active players on the site out of a total number of 86,000 sign ups.

Netplay also has a line of mobile quiz games waiting in the wings, which will be fed into the new lotto site EuroTeleMillions.com.

Players will be able to access the new service on the TV, Internet and through their mobiles by the end of 2008 and play quiz games, slot machines, a £1 million daily draw, and a €10 million weekly draw on Fridays.

Netplay will be also be launching online bingo in Sweden and Germany before the end of the year: the aim is to host all of their bingo products on one pan European brand: Eurobingo.com.

NetPlay has a UK gambling licence but is studying moving its business offshore which would net it £30,000 in savings.

Shuffle Master Inc which makes roulette chip sorters and electronic table games saw their profits swell by ten per cent. The company also manufactures card shufflers and video slot machines. Q3 net income came in at $3 million, or 8 cents a share, up $2.7 million year on year.

Total revenue was up 10% to $49.5 million.

A profit per share of around 10 cents a share is expected. Competition in this market segment comes from companies such as Elixir Gaming Technologies, Bally Technologies and International Game Technology.

Shuffle Master is based in Las Vegas, Nevada and shares stood at $5 at the end of the day´s trading on Tuesday on Nasdaq.

Casino software developer Wagerworks has just launched a supercharged version of online roulette that it is calling Three Wheel Roulette.
According to its developers, this new roulette offers its players 3 times as many opportunities to win per spin.

The game uses the well known roulette table betting system,  but adds a new feature called the Colour Up Bonus. Place a wager on this bonus feature, and the combination of the final numbers from the 3 wheels can net you a jackpot from a set of six possible payouts from 2:1 to 1000:1 on your bet.

The graphics are visually stunning too- the ball movement that you will see on your pc monitor was programmed using high speed video footage of real wheels. There is also a Speedy Gonzales option for impatient players called the Turbo. So if you have the fastest mouse in the house, you won´t be disapointed as you can make the same bet on the next round and start the wheel spinning from a single click which makes for ultra fast entertainment that should appeal to roulette pros and newbies alike.

Try the New 3 Wheel variant at Virgin Roulette.

Revenue from Ladbrokes' 8,100 touch screen roulette terminals have gone up by 18% and have overtaken the take from horse-racing bets - the first time any new betting product has done so in 122 years of trading.

Revenue from Ladbrokes' roulette machines for the six months were £142.5m, thanks to the recent loosening of advertising rules that has allowed Ladbrokes to run ads on the telly and to open later. The roulette machines and football bets have brought in a new type of player.

Ladbrokes also offers online roulette, of course: gross win from the Ladbrokes' online sites (poker, casino, bingo and games) steamed ahead 23% to £96m, but much of this increase was pumped back into the business in the form of free bets, promotions and bonuses as well as £19m that was spent on ads.

Try Ladbrokes Online Roulette

Ladbrokes have been lobbying Treasury officials to bring down the 15% gross profits tax charged on online sports bookies that are run from in the UK, pleading that their online business will not be able to compete head on against competitors who have set up offshore in tax havens like Costa Rica.

Euro 2008 was another winner. The competition had generated bets to a total of £30m - up from Euro 2004, despite England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland failing to qualify.

The touch-screen roulette machines - with a maximum jackpot of £500 - began to be distributed in Ladbrokes´ high street shops in the mid-90s and their popularity increased tax changes in 2001 made low-margin games attractive. The 2005 Gambling Act wrapped them into a regulated space. Government Ministers still say that the roulette machines are being monitored.