Korean gaming giant Krafton, known for its titles including PUBG: Battlegrounds and Battlegrounds Mobile India (BGMI), has acquired a full-speed stake in 12-year-old Indian gaming studio Nautilus Mobile for $14 million.
On Friday, the Korean gaming company confirmed to TechCrunch that it had acquired “75% stake North” at Nautilus, a popular game studio with a real cricket franchise focused on cricket enthusiasts.
The Pune-based studio is expected to close by the end of this month and will continue to operate independently after the transaction, where all 45 employees are expected to remain on Nautilus’s salary, Crafton told TechCrunch.
Founded in 2013, Nautilus has won millions of downloads for Real Cricket Franchise, which has five titles, including Real Cricket 24 and the Real Cricket Premier League.
Krafton aims to strengthen the “core competence” of mobile cricket game Nautilus. This is because of high demand in cricket-loving India, so by short-term improvements to existing titles and exploring new genres in the long term, Krafton India CEO Sean Hyunil Sohn said in an interview.
“Nautilus’ development capabilities will help Krafton double India’s gaming strategy, and will be able to build more games, more genres in both the Indian and global markets in the future,” Nautilus CEO Anuj Mankar told TechCrunch.
The company plans to expand Nautilus’ existence to other regions over time.
The Indian mobile gaming market is steadily growing, driven by a large base of young smartphone users. Mobile gaming dominates the country’s nationwide gaming industry by spending spending, accounting for 77.9% of total revenue, per market intelligence company Niko Partners. The company also estimates the country’s mobile gaming revenue will increase from $640 million in 2023 to $1.1 billion by 2028.
With net profits rising 119.3% year-on-year to around $889 million (KRW 1.3 trillion), Krafton sees India as a promising and important market for continuing its success. But much of the growth from India so far comes from the flagship title of local audiences Battlegrounds Mobile India (BGMI), which has earned the highest sales ever last year, surpassing 200 million downloads.
The company has other titles, including Bullet Echo India, Road to Valor, and Cookierun. However, they have not yet helped repeat the success story of the Battle Royale game, a localized version of PUBG.
This deal could help Krafton move beyond BGMI and attract new gamers by exploring new paths of success, including cricket and other sports games.
In 2020, Indian digital entertainment and technology company Jetsynthesys acquired a 100% stake in Nautilus Mobile. Then in 2022 Krafton’s strategic investment reached $5.4 million.
Thorne told TechCrunch that while Nautilus’ potential is the reason for its initial investment, Krafton has recognized its role as a minority stakeholder in supporting studio content development. He said that winning a stake in Control would allow for greater involvement in deeper collaboration and core development efforts with Nautilus.
“We strongly believe that there are many possibilities in the cricket game, and we hope to work with Nautilus to do our best possible efforts not only in India but also in other countries that play cricket and in other countries.
Jetsynthesys is a “significant minority” investor at Nautilus Mobile and will continue to work with studios in the area, including esports. The company has already worked with the studio to support real cricket games partners with cricket teams, including cricket teams associated with India’s most lucrative cricket tournament, Indian Premier League.
“Of course, over the long term, we’d also like to see increased revenue, increased user base, improved retention, all the usual things, and hopefully new transactions,” Bhat said of the question of how Krafton measures the success of transactions once completed.
To date, Krafton has invested more than $200 million in India, excluding Nautilus Mobile.
Krafton’s 20% investment in India comes from companies adjacent to games and games, but the company has also invested in Indian startups such as payment platform Cash-Free, audio platform Kuku FM and influencer marketing platform. He also supported funding, including Lumikai, which focused on games and the first Indian fund of IMM Investment.
“We are looking at opportunities for acquisitions, medium investments and even business collaboration with prominent players across the country,” Song said.
Nautilus will participate in 14 other game studios operating in markets around the world.