Wednesday, July 20, 2011
The company, best known for its Facebook Inc. apps such as Empires & Allies, FarmVille and CityVille, registered for an IPO of as much as $1 billion in its initial paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission. That value is merely a placeholder ...
Wednesday, July 20, 2011 0
Zynga is the creator of the wildly popular casual games FarmVille, CityVille, and Mafia Wars, which are played on the Facebook social network. The game company recently went public, valued in the range of $15 billion to $20 billion . [UPDATE] EA Sports has ...
Sunday, July 17, 2011
The popular social gaming company Zynga has filed for a $1 billion I.P.O.. The company behind games like FarmVille and CityVille counted a $90.6 million profit last year in the filing.
Here’s more about the I.P.O. from the NY Times: “The start-up, founded four years ago by its 45-year-old chief executive Mark Pincus, said it expected to raise about $1 billion in the offering, based on a figure used to calculate the registration fee … According to people briefed on the matter, Zynga is expected to ultimately offer up to 10 percent of its shares at a valuation near or above $20 billion.”
Last year we offered tips on how book publicity efforts could focus on related communities, matching genre with social gaming audience. Read more in our post, “How Publishers Can Use Social Games.”
Sunday, July 17, 2011 0
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
IPO Watch: Zynga Up Next? Wired News (blog) Zynga could file for an IPO as soon as Wednesday, Reuters reports, raising $1.5 billion to $2 billion in an offering that would value the maker of Farmville and Cityville at some $15 billion to $20 billion. ... |
Wednesday, July 13, 2011 0
 International Business Times AU | Today's Tech Talk and Rumours: Apple, Facebook, Zynga, Hacks International Business Times AU Zynga, maker of "FarmVille," "CityVille" and other games played on Facebook, is aiming to raise $1 billion in an initial public offering. According to the Form S-1 registration statement, the company had a net profit of $90 million on revenue of $597 ... |
 Globe and Mail | Zynga Opens the Kimono; We See Facebook Practical Ecommerce If you have ever played FarmVille, CityVille or Zynga Poker you're in good company — 148 million other people in 166 countries play Zynga's games monthly. And because people usually play more than one game each month, they account for 232 million ... Zynga's Got What It Takes Zynga brings in $500 million revenue for Facebook Zynga makes privacy a game with PrivacyVille |
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Zynga could file for an IPO as soon as Wednesday, Reuters reports, raising $1.5 billion to $2 billion in an offering that would value the maker of Farmville and Cityville at some $15 billion to $20 billion.
Reuters, citing “a source familiar with the situation,”said Morgan Stanley was expected to lead underwriters on the IPO.
It’s been a pre-bust IPO party on Wall Street already this year, with all eyes on the expected 2012 IPO of Facebook.
So far in 2011 the marquee tech IPOs have been:
Tuesday, July 12, 2011 0
More mobile from Zynga: CityVille Hometown VatorNews To get an idea of the game's popularity, run a search on the App Store for “cityville” and you'll see about 10 third-party apps pop up--some of them which cost money to download--offering tips, tricks and cheats for the Facebook version of the game. ... |
4 Signs Zynga Will Outperform Motley Fool Yet Zynga's FarmVille and CityVille each drew more than 40 million monthly active users within their first 100 days of release. All told, Zynga accounts for roughly 30% of Facebook's active user base, or more than 200 million users at last count. ... |
Friday, February 4, 2011
Tricia Duryee, On Wednesday February 2, 2011, 2:40 pm EST
Leveraging a recent mobile game studio acquisition, Zynga said today it plans to launch its second game for the Android operating system later this month.
The announcement piggy-backs on a number of improvements Google announced today as part of its Honeycomb mobile operating system version, including in-app purchases and the ability to browse and shop for applications from your computer.
Up until now there wasn’t a ton of motivation for game-makers, like Zynga, to adopt the Android platform because it was so difficult to monetize.
Zynga, which is known for its social games for Facebook, including CityVille and Mafia Wars, gives games away for free and monetizes by selling virtual goods to players.
Until today’s announcements that was very difficult on Android, making Apple’s iOS the preferred platform.
This signals Zynga’s commitment to embracing other platforms going forward.
Already, its Zynga Poker app was on Android, but it is adding “Word With Friends,” a game originally built by Newtoy and has more than 10 million users on Apple iOS. Now both Android and Apple users will be able to play against each other cross-platform.
Zynga says the features will be the same on both platforms, including the ability to play up to 20 simultaneous games at a time, in-game chat and push notifications. It will be released later this month and be free, with an ad-free premium version coming later.
Friday, February 4, 2011 0
Zynga, creator of the hit games FarmVille and CityVille, has acquired the indie game studio Area/Code for an undisclosed price.
The deal is Zynga’s ninth acquisition in eight months, and its second in the past three weeks. The deal gives Zynga a base of operations in New York City, where it can recruit talent from the many game makers in the area. The deal is one more example of how Zynga feels that it’s in a gold rush and has to lock up as much talent for making social games as it can.
Area/Code has made games on both Facebook and mobile phones, including the recent CSI: Crime City for Ubisoft. It also made Parking Wars and Drop7 for the iPhone. The latter game is a cool and addictive puzzle.
Area/Code will become Zynga New York, led by the studio’s executives Demetri Detsaridis and Frank Lantz, who will be general manager and creative director respectively.
Zynga’s past acquisitions include XPD in Beijing, Challenge Games in Austin, Unoh Games in Tokyo, Conduit Labs in Boston, Dextrose AG in Frankfurt, Bonfire Studios in Dallas, Newtoy in McKinney, Texas; and the team from Flock. Zynga has well beyond 1,200 employees now.
Zynga has more than 297 million monthly active users for its Facebook games alone. It gives away the games for free and charges players small amounts of real money for virtual goods, such as fuel for tractors in FarmVille. That has generated big revenues for the company, boosting its value and allowing it to raise a lot of money. Zynga thus has a huge arsenal of both cash and stock to acquire game developers.
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Tags: CSI: Crime City
Companies: Area/Code, Zynga
People: emetri Detsaridis, Frank Lantz
Social game giant Zynga – responsible for popular Facebook titles Mafia Wars and FarmVille – is looking to keep the “ville” moniker to itself. Techdirt is reporting that Zynga has sent cease and desist letters to independent game studio Blingville for alleged trademark infringement.
Zynga capitalizes on the “ville” name in a big way across its portfolio of titles. The roster currently includes the aforementioned FarmVille, as well as CityVille, FishVille, FrontierVille, PetVille, and YoVille.
Blingville argues that it has the right to retain its name – and that of its self-titled debut game – because the domain blingville.com has been registered for over five years. According to Blingville, Overtime Apps secured the domain in 2004 and filed a trademark registration late last year, before it “assigned all of its right title and interest in and to the 'Blingville' name and trademark application to Blingville."
The formal trademark for Blingville was filed with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office on November 5 of last year, three days after Zynga's cease-and-desist letter was delivered.
While Zynga hasn’t escalated the threat to an actual lawsuit, Blingville has filed a Complaint For Declaratory Judgment against Zynga asking the court to clear its name and for Zynga to cover any financial burdens associated with the initial cease and desist letters.
[Techdirt via Gamasutra]
