The successful World Poker Tour remains in the hands of Adam Pliska, the current CEO of the company who recently signed a new 4-year contract extension. Pliska, who has been leading the group since 2009, is described as a visionary who tripled the value of the company within several years by greatly expanding the operations of WPT, adding new products and increasing their quality.
In a February 27 press release, the company announced Chief Executive Officer Adam Pliska has agreed to a 4-year contract extension with World Poker Tour Enterprises. According to the company, he is behind the entire portfolio of the popular poker brand, including its live events and televised broadcasts. As a CEO and President of the WPT, he is also responsible for the strategic partnerships of the company, the release adds, which has been key to the brand’s exceptional success in the past decade or so.
Surprisingly enough, the 45-year-old Adam Pliska is not a poker player himself. He came aboard in 2003 as part of the legal team, but this was hardly the first endeavour he was taking on. At the age of 16, Pliska founded a T-shirt company, was a TV producer for a while, and eventually dropped all that to study law at UC Berkeley. The biggest success, however, came when he was hired as legal counsel for the World Poker Tour.
World Poker Tour under Pliska
Pliska joined WPT in 2003 and since 2009, when he took over as CEO, the company grew rapidly from a mostly national brand with merely 14 events in its calendar to an industry giant running 70 tournaments that reach 100 million viewers. Currently, with its various televised tournaments, land-based championships, online and mobile operations, World Poker Tour has a presence in more than 150 countries and regions. A lot of this is thanks to the innovation and successful management of Pliska.
According to the company, he was instrumental in the 2009 acquisition by bwin.Party Digital Entertainment and later, in 2015, in the WPT sale to Ourgame International Holdings Ltd. Interestingly, the 2009 deal was worth $12.3 million, while six years later, Ourgame International Holdings Ltd. paid nearly three times this number to acquire WPT, $35 million in cash. The company also admits that Pliska has been involved in the recent Zynga deal – Zynga was one of the first and most successful social game developers and is globally known for its FarmVille, Zynga Poker and Mafia Wars games.
Typically, only the CEOs of large technology companies become popular and Adam Pliska is an exception for the gambling and poker industries. He is a public figure, but unlike some managers and poker tycoons, he is not known for his extravagant lifestyle. On the contrary, Pliska’s name is associated with business success, legal, transparent operations, company mergers and multi-million deals.
- Author
Harry Evans
