It appears the long, drawn-out battle for bwin.party is over. On Friday, it was announced that the company’s board had unanimously approved a $1.7 billion offer from GVC Holdings, the owners of Sportingbet. bwin.party is the parent company of PartyPoker and bwin, among other brands.

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According to eGaming Review, the deal will likely close in the first quarter of 2016 and will “result in €125 million worth of revenue and cost synergies and create a platform which would provide ‘further consolidation opportunities.'” The acquisition was valued at 130 pence per share.

bwin.party’s board originally accepted an offer from 888 Holdings, the owners of 888 Poker, before a drama-filled few weeks that saw GVC up its bid, dump its original partner in the deal in Amaya Gaming, and ultimately come out on top. The final offer by 888 Holdings was 115 pence per share.

If you’re interested in the nitty-gritty details of the deal, according to EGR, “bwin.party shareholders will receive 25 pence in cash and 0.231 new GVC shares for each bwin.party share held, although a mix-and-match facility will be made available for those that would prefer to vary the proportion of cash and paper. The majority paper deal will mean bwin.party shareholders will assume 66.6% of the combined firm.”

It doesn’t look like 888, whose shareholders have been on a roller-coaster ride with the acquisition, will be submitting a better bid, as a statement from the company read, “The 888 board has concluded that, as a result of its own extensive due diligence on bwin.party, it cannot see sufficient value in bwin.party to warrant a revision to its offer. Consequently, 888 confirms that it is no longer in discussions regarding the acquisition of bwin.party.”

Winner: GVC.

GVC CEO Kenneth Alexander told EGR in a separate article, “The hard work starts now… It’s going to be challenging work but also fun work and, potentially, lucrative work… The large group will combine the very best talent GVC and bwin have. There are a lot of very talented people and I’ve been impressed by the bwin people I’ve met so far, so there will be lots of opportunities for employees on both sides of the business.”

EGR added that GVC will migrate Sportingbet to bwin.party’s platform and said that the company could divest its poker product.

In case you’re wondering, by the way, why there was such a lengthy battle for bwin.party, the Wall Street Journal explained the allure of the European gaming giant: “[bwin.party] owns much of its own technology and has strong brands across several product verticals, most notably sports betting, where bwin is well recognized globally.”

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