Founder-Led, Multi-Brand, Market-Ready: How Nexus International Scaled to $546M H1

Nexus International has reported $546 million in revenue for the first half of 2025, surpassing its full-year 2024 total of $400 million. The result represents a 110% year-on-year increase and positions the privately held group among the top 100 gaming operators worldwide by revenue.

Unlike its listed peers, Nexus has achieved this without external investors or a formal board structure. Founder and CEO Gurhan Kiziloz directs operations personally, a model that prioritises speed over consensus-driven governance. For Kiziloz, the structure is not a rejection of oversight but an intentional design to act decisively in markets where timing can define outcomes.

Most large operators in the sector, Flutter Entertainment, Entain, Bet365, rely on shareholder capital, investor committees, and board oversight to balance risk with growth. Nexus takes the opposite approach. Kiziloz has insisted on financing expansion internally, an unusual stance for a company scaling across more than 40 markets.

The absence of external capital means there are no investor expectations or dilution pressures. Decisions, from launching new platforms to entering new markets, are made centrally. The risk is concentrated but so too is the accountability.

“Without the delays often associated with large governance structures, we can act quickly to capture market opportunities,” Kiziloz said in a recent update.

The H1 result was powered by Nexus’s multi-brand portfolio: Spartans.com, Lanistar, and Megaposta.

  • Spartans.com expanded its content library to more than 5,900 games and continued to grow its presence in crypto-first markets where multi-currency betting is gaining traction.
  • Lanistar completed its transition into licensed gaming in 2025, broadening Nexus’s footprint across Europe and Latin America. The brand provides geographic diversification alongside Spartans.com and Megaposta.
  • Megaposta, Nexus’s Brazil-focused platform, secured early licensing under the country’s new iGaming framework and capitalised on a regulatory environment that is expected to deliver $10 billion in market revenue by 2029.

Brazil has become Nexus’s single largest market, and the company opened a São Paulo office in June to serve as its regional hub. Early licensing allowed Megaposta to avoid onboarding delays that affected rivals and to capture high-value players in a market where ARPU is forecast to exceed $1,500 by 2028.

Based on current momentum, Nexus projects a full-year run rate of $1.1–$1.2 billion, with a stretch target of $1.54 billion. If achieved, this would place it closer in scale to mid-sized public operators such as Betsson AB and Rank Group.

The trajectory underscores the debate about governance in fast-growing gaming businesses. On one side are publicly listed operators with diversified boards and deep investor pools. On the other are founder-led firms like Nexus, relying on concentrated decision-making and internal capital to compete at global scale.

The model carries both advantages and risks. Independence allows Nexus to move faster than many of its peers, but it also places full operational and financial responsibility on the founder. Industry analysts note that maintaining discipline across three brands and multiple regions will require continued investment in compliance and operational infrastructure, particularly as regulations tighten worldwide.

The São Paulo hub exemplifies this balancing act. It offers local proximity to regulators and consumers but also commits Nexus to significant fixed costs in a highly competitive environment. Global giants including Flutter, Entain, and Bet365 are simultaneously scaling in Brazil, often with far greater capital resources.

For Kiziloz, the principle remains constant: conviction and speed outweigh shared governance. Nexus has doubled revenue year-on-year and entered the global top 100 without external funding, a rare feat in the sector. The company’s challenge now is to sustain that momentum while navigating the complexities of regulation, competition, and scale.

As the gaming industry consolidates, Nexus’s performance in Brazil and beyond will test whether founder-led independence can continue to rival capital-backed expansion. For now, the numbers show a company proving that rapid execution, without investors, can deliver outsized results.

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