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Supercell increases its investment stake in Space Ape Games by 75%

Supercell invests a whopping $37M in the game developing company!

Supercell is a game development company behind popular games like Clash of Clans, Clash Royale, Boom Beach, and so on. Supercell has decided to increase its stake in the London-based company, Space Ape Games by 75%. They are known to develop games like Beatstar, Rival Kingdoms, and Transformers: Earth Wars. Previously Supercell had invested $55.6 million in Space Ape Games in 2017 for a 62.6% stake which they have now decided to increase by adding an amount of $37 million to the deal.

“The reasoning is first and foremost the success of Beatstar game, as we spent years working on, learning and mastering a category of music games, we have had success in that category and promise that we can continue to improve in that category. Through the game, we’re working on extensions for the future. It’s compelling to us and Supercell.” said John Earner, Space Ape Games CEO, in an interview with GamesBeat.

Funding will help Space Ape Games grow its team and scale marketing

Now as the value of the studio has increased and Supercell, whose majority is owned by Tencent is also extending a $50 million line of credit to Space Ape Games. This will bring the company’s total debt and equity investment to $189 million.

“The financing will help us chase that success, I do think the second thing behind that story is confidence and enthusiasm on what else we’re doing, how much we’ve grown over the last few years beyond the music category and a couple of other things we’re doing as well. So ultimately, it’s a success story message. They’re increasing their stake in our company to help us chase success.” said Earner.

Beatstar Black Eyes Peas Single
Image via Space Ape Games

The company’s most popular app Beatstar was released worldwide in August 2021 has reached Number 1 on the overall charts in 24 countries. It has featured in the top 10 in 70 countries and has become the top-grossing music game globally too. The popular game has surpassed over $60 million in revenue and has been played by over 30 million people. It has also won the Game of the Year award at the 2022 Mobile Game Awards.

Supercell ID has also been integrated into Beatstar for players can challenge their clanmates through the app

Several team members of Supercell have worked closely with Beatstar to make the integration a success. Now players can share their scores and challenge teammates by just using their Supercell ID in the popular rhythm title. It also features remixes of theme songs of Supercell games along with events, tournaments, and more music genres.

“We couldn’t be more impressed with Space Ape’s team, their culture, and their ability to make innovative and incredibly fun games like Beatstar,” said Jaakko Harlas, investment lead at Supercell, in a statement.

Space Ape Games is working on several new projects and looks to earn more revenue

The company is a mobile free-to-play game developer and publisher which was founded in 2012. It has a team of over 120 people working on several game projects. The games launched by the company have generated more the 105 million downloads to date and have also earned a revenue of more than $300 million. One of the new titles which their team is working on is a mobile multiplayer action game, Boom Beach: Frontlines.

Boom beach frontlines
Image via Space Ape Games

The CEO has also said that a few different games are in the works at the given time in the company. The success of Beat star motivated them to create more great projects and for that reason, they are hiring more employees to work on the projects. He has stated that the companies need to find better ways to serve players who aren’t being served well enough and that all of them need to focus more on community and better ways to market games.

Earner Space Ape Games
John Earner, CEO Space Ape Games

Earner also said that the integration of Supercell ID into the Beaststar game which enabled the team to learn more about the players was important because of Apple’s privacy changes which affected the Identifier for Advertisers (IDFA). This change is believed to make the industry more fragile as it made it harder to acquire new users for games.

As of now, 30 people are working on the Beatstar game and the number will most probably increase in the future. The increase of Supercell’s stake in the company seems like a good move as they seem to work great together and players can look forward to the development of more better and unique games in the future.

What are your thoughts as Supercell has invested $37 million more in Space Ape Games? Let us know in the comments below!

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