TheScore’s first quarter goes smoothly

The mobile sports media co. hit record revenue, crediting Canadian direct sales and U.S. programmatic operations for its success.

TheScore set records with its revenue and profits this quarter.

The Toronto-based mobile sports news company announced that for the quarter ended Dec. 31, it brought in $9.5 million, with a total EBITDA of $1 million.

Revenue was up 13% from F1 2018, and EBITDA grew by $0.5 million. TheScore attributed its revenue growth from strong direct ad sales in Canada, as well as growth in its U.S. ad revenue, which is largely programmatic.

Sessions per user were up. The app saw a total of 469 million sessions, an average of 111 times per user. TheScore boasts an audience of 4.2 million average monthly app users, down slightly from Q1 2018 (4.3 million).

While the company has not reported on the revenue generated from its e-sports division, it confirmed that its video content is at an all-time high in terms of engagement, resulting in a total of 40.3 million views for the quarter, growth of 123%. The company has identified both e-sports and its social content as growing areas of the business. Its YouTube channel reached 296 million views, resulting in growth of 867% year-over-year. Social content reached 67 million users, which equaled growth of 119% year-over-year. The strong growth for both YouTube and social content was largely due to the media co. producing more content.

Founder and CEO John Levy said in the company’s quarterly call that theScore now sees an opportunity in sports betting for the coming fiscal year. Early this year, the company will launch a mobile sportsbook in order to facilitate betting. This would mainly benefit theScore through its U.S. operations.