Las Vegas-based Playstudios has acquired casual game maker Brainium for $70m.
Playstudios runs Tetris mobile plus a range of slots and bingo games, and with Brainium’s roster of casual and card games on board, has diversified its portfolio significantly. The acquisition consists of $70m in cash upfront, and is contingent on Brainium’s performance up until December 31st 2022, when the deal will likely close.
The move more than doubles Playstudios’ daily active user base, says the firm, which looks set to implement its real-world reward-based Playawards loyalty program in its new portfolio of games.
Brainium was founded in 2008 and is based in Portland, Oregon. It is led by former Amazon and Microsoft exec Scott Willoughby, and currently has 34 staff. It will retain its brand name and leadership as part of the deal, and currently has 10 live titles on app stores. The studio says it reaches almost 5.5m monthly active users and 2m daily active users, and its revenue and AEBITDA for 2022 is expected to come in at $22m and $8.8m respectively.
For Playstudios founder and CEO Andrew Pascal, the deal is all about portfolio diversification. “Brainium brings a suite of thoughtfully designed and highly engaging casual games to Playstudios,” he said. “It also further diversifies our business by complementing our largely in-app-purchase based revenue model with a meaningful amount of advertising revenue. We look forward to welcoming the Brainium team and working together to fully leverage our combined strengths in order to put real-world rewards in the hands of significantly more players.”
