Harrah's denies breaching contract with Everest Poker

[The Buzz]

Earlier this month Everest Poker sued Harrah's Entertainment, the owner of the World Series of Poker, claiming the WSOP breached a sponsorship agreement. The lawsuit claimed that the WSOP breached the sponsorship agreement when an ESPN affiliate in France, RTL9, displayed the logo of Full Tilt Poker in its coverage instead of Everest Poker's logo.

Well Harrah's has responded to the lawsuit, saying that it had never breached a contract with Everest Poker or the owner of Everest, Ultra Internet Media S.A. (UIM).

From the Las Vegas Sun:

"Nobody from Harrah's made any representation during any of the negotiations or in the promotional agreement concerning any ESPN distribution or WSOP programming in France," Harrah's attorneys said in their filing.

"Indeed, at the time of the negotiations, UIM did not have an online gaming license recognized by French authorities. It was broadly observed that poker programming was not distributed by French television stations unless tournaments were sponsored by a French licensee," the filing said.


"In 2008 and 2008 the WSOP was broadcast by ESPN and parties with whom it has contracted in over 170 countries, including the United States, collectively to over 250 million households, for over 6,000 hours. Thus, UIM has certainly gained all the exposure for the everestpoker.net website that it could have hoped for, and more," Harrah's said in the filing.

[Anthony]

Looks like we have two different stories...