Gameplay.com, the online games retailer started by former Bradford man Dylan Wilk, has made major strides in its bid to become the biggest European player in its field.

It recently bought Computec Media, Germany's largest online games magazine publisher, in a £48 million deal.

And announcing the company's interim results, chief executive Mark Bernstein said: "We are well placed for further rapid expansion in the second half.

"The European games market is being supercharged by technological advances and our position is rapidly strengthening across all platforms."

When Gameplay was floated in August last year, it immediately made a millionaire of one of its founders, 25-year-old Mr Wilk, who set it up with a £2,500 grant from the Prince's Trust from his former home in Batley.

Mr Wilk was brought up in Bradford and is an old boy of Bradford Grammar School.

Before the flotation, Gameplay had already absorbed BT's Internet games subsidiary, Wireplay, and merged it with Wilk's ICE mail-order games company.

The company would be worth an estimated £588.9 million if it was sold - despite having a turnover for the six months to January 31 of only £5.8 million.

The company made a pre-tax loss of £10.4 million for the six months ending January 31, 2000.

Gameplay also has agreements with BSkyB, Cable and Wireless and BT to provide games for their cable and satellite channels.

Its online gaming division, Wireplay, now supports over 120 titles and use of the service grew by 160 per cent over the same period last year.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.