Reliance Entertainment plans to begin acquiring North American and European mobile game studios starting in early 2015, in hopes of becoming a significant global player in the fast-growing mobile games industry.
The company, which is the biggest stakeholder in DreamWorks Animation Studios, is in talks with bankers to identify and acquire up-and-coming mobile game studios in North America and Europe to boost sales, Chief Executive Manish Agarwal told Reuters in a phone interview.
“We will go full steam in the January and February time frame in terms of identifying studios,” Agarwal said. “Gaming is going to be the largest share of the pie of entertainment time spent, and Reliance would like to be a sizeable player in that space.”
Reliance Entertainment is a unit of Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani, one of largest conglomerates, with businesses ranging from financial services to infrastructure and power. Its Reliance Games unit is looking at smaller studios at $2 million to $5 million a pop, at least initially, according to Agarwal.
Agarwal said the potential for Reliance Games is “huge.”
“In three years, our business will make $50 million in net revenue, and in five years we’ll be a $100 million company,” he said. Net revenue is after cuts taken by app stores from Google, Apple and others.
Reliance Games, which to date has focused on making titles related to Hollywood properties in partnership with studios such as Warner Bros, Sony and Lions Gate, hopes to use acquisitions to expand into other genres, Agarwal said. Genres of interest include real-time action strategy akin to Supercell’s “Clash of Clans,” puzzlers like King’s “Candy Crush Saga,” builder games like Supercell’s “Boom Beach,” and social casino games.
Reliance Games develops its own titles at its Pune-based studio in India as well as partnering with other game studios. With about 50 million downloads, its most successful game franchise has been “Real Steel,” with action titles based on the DreamWorks movie with the same name featuring Hugh Jackman.
In the face of competition from larger and more seasoned players such as King and Japan’s GungHo Online Entertainment, Reliance has yet to make waves in a competitive mobile gaming space that investors worry is a fickle, hit-driven business.
