MAJOR ACHIEVEMENTS

As a founder of DraftKings, Kalish has held executive positions in the company since its inception and worked alongside Paul Liberman and Jason Robins to guide DraftKings to its current market position. In fiscal year 2022, the company’s net cash flow was $625.5m.  

The company offers both sports betting and fantasy sports betting through both mobile and land-based sportsbooks. DraftKings has also partnered with major sporting leagues, various American Tribal casinos and has even dabbled in horseracing.  

Under Kalish’s leadership since taking on the role of President in January 2020, DraftKings has made several notable moves and business partnerships.  

In November 2021 DraftKings partnered with the NBA in a multi-year agreement to become a co-official sports betting partner of the League. Later, in May 2022, DraftKings acquired online gambling operator Golden Nugget for $1.56bn. 

The company also began publicly trading during Kalish’s tenure as President, trading on Nasdaq, doing so following a $3.3bn merger with SBTech and Diamond Eagle Acquisition Corp. 

EMPLOYMENT

Prior to co-founding DraftKings, Kalish held several jobs. His first position of note was as an operations analyst for Fidelity Investments from mid-2004 to mid-2005, before spending four months as a reporting analyst for Microsoft.  

Kalish worked as a General Manager for Capital One from 2006 to 2009. He then worked for Vistaprint as its CRM Marketing Manager. Kalish held his role at Vistaprint from 2009 to 2012. 

PRODUCTS LAUNCHED

Kalish launched DraftKings as a fantasy sports platform with Liberman and Robins in 2012, running it from Liberman’s house. A year later the MLB was investing in DraftKings and has now established strategic partnerships with NFL, NHL, PGA Tour and many others. 

The company became publicly tradable in 2020.  

The company signed a deal with Passamaquoddy Tribe in Maine in November 2023 to launch an online sportsbook. The company reached the agreement with the Tribe prior to the debut of Maine’s online sports betting market.  

DraftKings Sportsbook also opened a location at the Queen Baton Rogue in Louisiana in August 2023. The retail location welcomed close to 1,000 guests following a ribbon-cutting ceremony. 

In addition to multiple sportsbooks, DraftKings launched its first horseracing product, DK Horse in 12 US states through an ongoing agreement with CDI. The partnership was first announced in November 2022 and went live in March 2023.  

“When we started DraftKings Inc., we could have never predicted PASPA would be repealed, and sports betting would become a multi-billion-dollar industry. “But we did know that there were tons of people like us who share the same DNA and like to compete and predict things.  We saw how that passion brought people together.” Matt Kalish