Victor Chandler launches new Internet poker room and gathers partners to become the worldís biggest epoker destination

Player to player online poker was today dealt a superb hand by the news that Victor Chandler has launched its own site vcpoker.com.

The destination will draw on a huge player base as participants will also be recruited from partner sites including www.racingpost.co.uk, www.freeserve.co.uk, www.tiscali.co.uk and www.virgin.co.uk.

Gambling giant Victor Chandler teamed up with a legendary name in poker, Tribeca Tables, to create the proprietary software to drive the site.

It aims to bring together poker players of all abilities from across the world in a friendly community environment. Beginners can watch and learn from the sidelines while the more experienced compete for money and take part in organised tournaments. All players are welcome except those from the US and other territories where online gambling is prohibited.

Victor Chandler is the first to launch an aggregated cardroom, allowing it to leverage the brand loyalty of all the participating brands. Because of this, VC believes www.vcpoker.com will quickly become the worldís leading online poker community. It plans to add more high volume partners soon.

Michael Carlton, CEO of Victor Chandler said: "We expect poker to be one of the fastest growing elements in online gambling as a whole because of that human dimension: Quite simply, people love to play against each other. The software and back-up systems we have in place should make vcpoker.com the worldís premier destination for fans of the game."

The site is being launched with the world's most popular poker game, Texas Holdem, and other games will be added in the near future. Those playing for money can start at as little as five cents a hand and VC is also offering a great sign up bonus to attract new players.

The new service is launching at a time of significant growth for online gambling. Around 700,000 people regularly play poker online in the US. And according to market analyst Datamonitor, UK revenues for the entire online gambling sector are set to grow from an estimated £503m in 2000 to £1.2bn by 2005.

The site goes live from today on www.vcpoker.com and via the home pages of www.racingpost.co.uk, www.freeserve.co.uk, www.tiscali.co.uk and www.virgin.co.uk.

Ends

For further information contact: Alison Digges at Victor Chandler on (44) 207 928 3133
or email [email protected]

About the Victor Chandler Casino Division

Victor Chandler Worldwide (VCW) is one of the worldís most established and well respected online gaming companies. The parent company is the largest independent bookmaker in the UK and is over 50 years old. The casino division of VCW was started in 2000 to capitalise on the growing market for online play and the position of the parent company as a trusted brand.

In addition to vcpoker.com, there are four casino products in the VCW portfolio. They are: The Spin Room (www.thespinroom.com), a java based casino which was launched in March 2001 for the UK market; Victor Chandler casino (www.victorchandlercasino.com), a multiplayer downloadable casino for UK players; Victor Casino (www.victorcasino.com), an Asian facing casino with dealer voices in Mandarin, Cantonese as well as English; Victor Games (www.victorgames.com), a site featuring games of chance and aimed at the "soft gaming" market.

About Tribeca Tables

Tribeca Tables was founded in 2001 to create the world's premiere multi-player online ePoker experience. With over 20 years of active poker room management and 50 years of world-class poker experience, the team behind Tribeca Tables brings unmatched poker expertise to the Internet. Combined with a marketing and development team responsible for one of the 100 most popular web sites on the Internet, Tribeca Tables brings pioneering brand, community, eMarketing, and client/server technologies to the world of online poker.