Animoca Brands scores Tencent deal （Games）

＊Ourpalm, a leading player in China’s mobile gaming market, has invested $3.1 million in Animoca Brands, taking shares at 21c each.

＊In 2014, the region’s 760 million mobile gamers generated $US13.6 billion in revenue, accounting for 55 per cent of the global mobile gaming market.

SUPRATIM ADHIKARI 

23 SEP, 9:14 AM

ASX-listed mobile game maker Animoca Brands has scored an exclusive distribution deal with Chinese digital entertainment and technology giant Tencent.

The deal will see Tencent distribute Animoca’s Armies Of Dragons through the popular messaging service WeChat in five Asian countries. Under the terms of the agreement, Animoca and Tencent will share the revenue generated from the title’s in-game purchase options.

Armies Of Dragons will be channelled via WeChat for a year in Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand.

The title will be available for download on WeChat, which boasts over 600 million monthly active users in the region, in November 2015.

The Tencent agreement is the latest move by Animoca to carve out deeper channels in the broader Asian market. In July, the company welcomed Chinese mobile content provider Ourpalm on to its books, with the company taking a 11.1 per cent in the game maker.  

Ourpalm, a leading player in China’s mobile gaming market, has invested $3.1 million in Animoca Brands, taking shares at 21c each. It also has the option to invest a further $US5m into the ASX-listed company, subject to an increase in the value of its current investment.

Meanwhile, the Tencent-Animoca agreement also allows WeChat to diversify its offering and further expand its interest in the gaming vertical.  

According to the Global Mobile Games Confederation (GMGC), Asia Pacific is considered the world’s largest market for the mobile game industry. In 2014, the region’s 760 million mobile gamers generated $US13.6 billion in revenue, accounting for 55 per cent of the global mobile gaming market.