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The mystery surrounding the owners of online gaming sites is clearing as their businesses head for the stock market.

Party Poker recently appointed Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein and Investec to advise it on a possible flotation. If it lists, the site is tipped to head straight into the FTSE 100 index of leading companies, making fortunes for the founders, Ruth Parasol, Anurag Dikshit, Russ de Leon and Vikrant Bhargava.

Bhargava declined to comment on the float plans or the size of the shareholdings owned by the business’s founders. He said the seeds of the business were sown in May 2000 at a gaming-industry expo in Montreal, where the executives, who were already involved with gaming software, first heard about Paradise Poker.

Liking the idea, they set about creating their own version, and launched Party Poker in August 2001. Less than two years later, the progeny had overtaken the inspiration to become market leader, a position it still holds.

Other sites have been founded by newcomers to the world of e-commerce and technology. Poker Room, a Scandinavian operation, was set up in 1999 by two students, Oskar Hörnell and Claes Lidell, who met at Sweden’s Uppsala university and were keen poker players. Having travelled round American casinos refining their game, they launched Poker Room after teaming up with Hörnell’s brother Karl, a computer programmer.

Their business, which claims to have 3.2m players, has more than trebled its revenues in the past year to $60m.

Bhargava said the appeal of online poker is that, unlike traditional bricks-and-mortar card rooms, it allows players to gamble for low stakes. “I could never find a casino where I could play poker at low enough stakes where I felt comfortable. The atmosphere is intimidating and the stakes are too high. (Online poker) provides clean, inexpensive entertainment.”

GROWTH in the online poker market has been nothing short of phenomenal. The numbers are enough to make your eyes water, according to one leisure analyst. But, impatient as ever, City folk are already starting to wonder where the next spurt of growth is likely to be found in the world of online gaming.

In a report published last week by Durlacher and Edison, the City broking and research firms, analysts wrote: “There is little sign that the explosion in online poker is abating, but already operators are looking for the next big growth segment.”

A number of areas seem likely to provide it, not least bingo and what has been dubbed “cash-skill gaming” — a catch-all for sites offering chess, backgammon, quizzes and puzzles.

The global market for cash-skill gaming is estimated to have grown from £19.5m three years ago to £76.3m last year, and is on a course to expand by 40% a year.

Greg Harris, an analyst at Cannaccord Capital, said some of the dynamics were broadly similar to those enjoyed by online poker: “Both poker and skill gaming are driven by liquidity. The more players you have, the better the service.”

Some of the bigger operators in this space are owned by London-listed companies such as Skill Jam, part of AIM-quoted Fun Technologies.

At the tail end of last year, two British sites were launched in the sector — Riskclub.com and Riskology.co.uk. Ben Hewitt, founder of Riskology, which offers punters prizes such as plasma-screeen televisions and Ducatti motorbikes, said the site has attracted more than 5,000 users and the company is contemplating versions for Japan, Australia and, crucially, America.

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That is the other attraction of cash-skill gaming — with the exception of eight states in America, this kind of betting is legal because it is not perceived to be gambling. As a result, online casino operators are starting to offer games in America as a way of safely tapping into this market.

But perhaps the holy grail for interactive betting groups is gambling via television. Last year, William Hill, the British bookmaker, launched its own digital-television station, showing a mixture of live greyhound racing and interactive games, such as roulette. Nobody at the company expects its popularity to mushroom — yet.

“It will be step-by-step,” said David Harding, chief executive. Investors will get an idea of its progress when William Hill presents its annual results on Wednesday.

Many television stations see gambling and interactive games as a surefire way of increasing revenues. Among the plethora of digital-television stations are Life TV and You TV, which litter their schedules with interactive games offering viewers the chance to win cash prizes. There are also channels such as Avago, dedicated to numbers games, while Sky, part-owned by News Corporation, ultimate owner of The Sunday Times, has its own casino station.

The popularity of online poker has been fuelled by the success of live television poker. It cannot be long before the technology develops sufficiently to allow interactive poker on television.

ONLINE POKER: THE FACTS

Sources: Pokerpulse.com; Durlacher; Datastream