The arrangement is assessed at an amount potentially attaining $1 billion — the ultimate figure hinges on Loom Games meeting specific performance levels, according to a representative from Scopely.
Based in Istanbul, Loom Games was established in the prior year and is the originating force behind the mobile puzzle sensation known as Pixel Flow!, which, since its introduction in the fall, has drawn in 10 million players, Scopely declared in an announcement issued on Thursday.
The individuals who founded Loom, Kübra Gündoğan and Emre Çelik, will remain in charge of the studio, composed of approximately 20 individuals situated in Turkey.
Headquartered in California, Scopely concentrates on mobile-based games and releases well-known titles, notably Monopoly Go! and Pokémon Go. The ownership of the company is held by Savvy Games Group, a gaming investment conglomerate, which is itself a component of the Public Investment Fund (PIF), the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia.
Saudi Arabia is in the process of shifting its economy away from dependency on petroleum and is employing PIF, Savvy, and Scopely to aggressively pursue agreements aimed at establishing itself as a significant participant in the video game sector. Roughly 62 percent of the nation’s inhabitants identify as gamers and engage in gaming activities either every week or every day, as per Niko Partners, as reported by Bloomberg News. The kingdom’s leader and PIF chairman, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has established his public persona as a modern thinker and has openly professed his fondness for video games, expressing a preference for Call of Duty from Microsoft Corp.
In September, Electronic Arts Inc. entered into an agreement to be acquired by a collection of investors, encompassing a sovereign wealth entity, in what marks the largest leveraged buyout on record. As Bloomberg News had detailed previously, PIF held the position of the foremost participant in the transaction. The fund also possesses a stake in Nintendo Co.
PIF brought Savvy into existence in 2021 and designated Brian Ward, a seasoned professional from the gaming realm, as CEO. Savvy completed the acquisition of the esports enterprise ESL FACEIT Group in 2022, followed by Scopely in 2023.
This arrangement represents yet another noteworthy acquisition in Turkey, a nation that has risen to prominence as a worldwide hub for mobile gaming, attributable to its developers’ substantial skill in the area of casual gaming. Back in 2020, Zynga Inc., the originating entity behind FarmVille, procured Peak Games, a Turkish firm, for an amount of $1.8 billion, and Dream Games, the developer responsible for Royal Match, was valued at $5 billion during a funding initiative conducted in the preceding year.
Source: Bloomberg