Game acquisitions are not slowing down.
Gaming-technology platform company Imperus has announced today its plan to acquire the Tel Aviv-based social-game developer Diwip. The deal would have Imperus spending nearly $100 million to purchase all of the shares in Diwip. Once completed, this acquisition will give Imperus control over Best Casino, which is one of the higher-grossing games on mobile and Facebook. Mobile gaming generated $16 billion in consumer spending worldwide last year, and social casino games are one of the biggest reasons for that.
[aditude-amp id="flyingcarpet" targeting='{"env":"staging","page_type":"article","post_id":1579101,"post_type":"story","post_chan":"none","tags":null,"ai":false,"category":"none","all_categories":"games,","session":"B"}']Imperus likely found Diwip particularly appealing due to its recent growth. The developer went from revenues of $7.8 million in 2011 to $28.3 million in 2013. Diwip also claims to have 24 million registered customers across its numerous games.
In addition to its original games, Diwip also supplies proprietary game-making software to other companies. Licensing technology like that is a lucrative business, and it was another draw for Imperus.
This deal continues 2014 as the year of the games-industry mega-acquisitions. Through the third quarter, deals like Facebook buying Oculus for $2 billion and Amazon acquiring Twitch for $970 million have pushed total industry acquisitions to over $12 billion.
Imperus’s $100 million has the industry well on its way to $13 billion in acquisitions before the year is out.