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Japanese Gaming Firm DeNA to Acquire iPhone Developer Ngmoco for $400 Million

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MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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In a sign of the increasing size of the iPhone app business, early App Store success story Ngmoco is set to be acquired by Japanese social gaming firm DeNA for $400 million.
DeNA, the Japanese social game giant, said Tuesday that it would acquire Ngmoco, a Silicon Valley iPhone game developer, for $400 million - one of the largest deals ever involving an iPhone application developer and another sign that the iPhone is fast becoming the hottest game device on the market.
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DeNA's pursuit of Ngmoco comes as the Japanese firm seeks to rapidly expand its existing focus, which includes a dominant mobile social gaming platform in its home country, to an international and cross-platform scale.
Though the company is little known outside Japan, DeNA's projected revenue for this year is already on par with estimates for Facebook. DeNA booked sales of about ¥48 billion yen, or $575 million. Ms. Namba said it was on track to double that figure this fiscal year to more than $1 billion.
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DeNA has purchased or invested in several other U.S. gaming firms in recent months, but the deal for Ngmoco marks by far its largest foray into the market.

Ngmoco was one of the initial recipients of money from the high-profile $100 million iFund venture capital pool offered by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. The company had some early App Store success with the likes of Topple and Rolando, but has since become more focused on social gaming with such titles as its We Rule/We Farm/We City series.

Article Link: Japanese Gaming Firm DeNA to Acquire iPhone Developer Ngmoco for $400 Million
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2010/10/12/japanese-gaming-firm-dena-to-acquire-iphone-developer-ngmoco-for-400-million/
B

BeachChair

macrumors 6502a
Apr 11, 2008
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Sky Blue said:
Stopped caring about ngmoco after the started with that freemium crap.

RIP Rolando
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Same. They need to stop releasing half-baked games. Their latest games are entertaining the first hour, then the game slows down to a boring crawl, obviously in an attempt to lure you into paying for further progress.
 
M

mrelwood

macrumors regular
Apr 8, 2010
131
0
Wow. Not sure if DeNA would get much hold of Finnish markets... In Finnish street language "dena" means boozer, an alcoholic with no grip on life. Those who live under the bridges.

I believe the word comes from "denatured spirits".
 
J

jacollins

macrumors 6502a
Jun 19, 2010
531
0
BeachChair said:
Same. They need to stop releasing half-baked games. Their latest games are entertaining the first hour, then the game slows down to a boring crawl, obviously in an attempt to lure you into paying for further progress.
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Perhaps why they sold out? Personally, I think that market is a bit of a fad, and will go away. If that's the case, then this is a great time to cash out (for $400 million).
 
GFLPraxis

GFLPraxis

macrumors 604
Mar 17, 2004
7,152
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Macrumors said:
and another sign that the iPhone is fast becoming the hottest game device on the market.
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These kinds of quotes always bug me.

The iPhone is becoming big for casual games and indie games, but I'm seeing very few established brands. We are seeing a lot of franchise cash-ins, like movie games such as Iron Man, but these are bad games. We're also seeing shoddy multiplatform ports so that developers can claim to release the game on iPhone/DS/Wii/XBox360/PS3 (example: Street Fighter IV, which is terrible on the iPhone), and then a bunch of original indie titles.

While the indie titles are great, and the iPhone might eat into the DS's casual market and stuff like DSiWare, we're seeing very few established gaming brands, and the ones that we do see are bad ports. The iPhone's game library is pretty crappy.
 
H

hugodrax

macrumors 65816
Jul 15, 2007
1,225
640
Wow they really overpaid. 400Million is a REAL HIGH valuation for an iPhone developer.
 
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iPhoney:)

macrumors member
Jan 15, 2009
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0
It's kind of screwy how a Japanese or Chinese company can gobble up an American at the drop of a hat but if an American company tries to purchase one of theirs, extremely nationalistic and xenophobic laws prevent it from happening, in other words, it's illegal. :confused:

America is not quiet free but it happens to be bargain basement of the world!
 
R

radebe

macrumors newbie
Mar 14, 2008
17
0
Norwich, UK
ngmoco != developers

It's not really accurate to call ngmoco developers – they're more publishers of games developed by others (and in my opinion tend to ruin them a bit). So if you want more games like Rolando, follow what Hand Circus are doing who are the actual developers. Equally, if you like the freemium stuff, then look at Wonderland Software and New Toy – forget about ngmoco!
 
D

Dr Kevorkian94

macrumors 68020
Jun 9, 2009
2,176
81
SI, NY
iPhoney:) said:
It's kind of screwy how a Japanese or Chinese company can gobble up an American at the drop of a hat but if an American company tries to purchase one of theirs, extremely nationalistic and xenophobic laws prevent it from happening, in other words, it's illegal. :confused:

America is not quiet free but it happens to be bargain basement of the world!
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o yea on this subject i can ramble on, controversial politics all that suff but lets stay away from that or this form will get put of hand lol
 
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