Gree Ventures Making Moves
Triple shot of press releases from Gree today related to international expansion and their new gaming platform plans: http://bit.ly/suYVVa
Most interesting perhaps would be revised fiscal forecast upwards of 40 – 50% clearly this space is Rockin! [Eds]
GREE to Begin Investing in Southeast and East Asia
GREE today announced that it has resolved to enter the venture capital business with a focus on Internet business-related start-up companies. For the entry, GREE has established a wholly-owned subsidiary, GREE Ventures, and formed a GV-I investment partnership which globally invests in Internet-related businesses under the management of GREE Ventures.
Aiming to boost the Internet market, not only in Japan but throughout the world, GREE will support the growth of promising unlisted venture companies which operate mainly in the Internet market in Southeast Asia and East Asia, where long term expansion is expected.
Positioning the GV-I Investment Partnership as its core, GREE’s new business will conduct investment activities focusing on start-up companies that have the potential to play an active role in global markets mainly in the Southeast Asia and East Asia utilizing GREE’s global network.
GREE to turn “Kawaii Pet MEGU” Developer MARS into Wholly-Owned Subsidiary
Currently focusing on the development and operation of social games in order to grow its social networking service (SNS) “GREE” into a global platform, GREE will make MARS into a wholly-owned subsidiary in order to strengthen its development capability for smartphone apps and enhance its line-up of attractive social games.
MARS possesses abundant development experience in smartphone apps through its subsidiary, FEYNMAN, and operates a popular app, “Kawaii Pet MEGU (Breeding game MEGU),” which recently recorded a cumulative number 807,000 downloads (as of October 28, 2011).
By turning MARS and FEYNMAN into wholly-owned subsidiaries, GREE expects to reinforce its development capability for smartphone apps and to create synergy among the three companies by sharing human resources and operational know-how. Moreover, GREE forecasts higher profitability by using GREE’s know-how in “Kawaii Pet MEGU (Breeding game MEGU).”
GREE continues to provide high quality content to as many users as possible and aims to provide the best community services to be used all over the world.
GREE to Announce New Worldwide Mobile Social Gaming Platform for 2012
GREE today announced plans to launch a new platform by mid-2012, aiming to provide a global social gaming experience and more robust features for players and developers. This is consistent with the GREE strategy of developing products specific to the international free-to-play market.
“This new platform allows our partners to focus on increasing engagement and revenue, while continuing to offer the most comprehensive free-to-play gaming experience,” said Naoki Aoyagi, CEO of GREE International. “The new platform will leverage OpenFeint and GREE assets and will bring together Western and Asian mobile social markets with a goal of reaching over one billion users.”
GREE revised their earnings forecast for the fiscal year ending June 2012, which now projects operating profit of 60 billion to 70 billion yen *1, a 40% to 50% increase over the initial forecast. GREE’s network continues to grow at a rate of 3.8 users per second, and maintains one of the highest average revenues per user (ARPU) in the industry. Additionally, GREE has seen significant global expansion this year, with new offices in the United States, China, Korea, Singapore, UK, Netherlands and plans for Brazil.