MTG ups InnoGames stake to 51%
Another €82.6 million buys majority of the German publisher; MTG says this is a "first step" in growing new gaming vertical
The Modern Times Group has invested a further €82.6 million in InnoGames, raising its stake in the German free-to-play publisher to 51%.
MTG, a digital entertainment company based in Sweden, first invested in InnoGames in October 2016, at which point the prospect of eventually purchasing a majority stake was already on the table. This €82.6 million investment has made that prospect a reality, and is based on the same €260 million valuation of InnoGames as last October.
"InnoGames is a great business with great products, and is already performing above our expectations when we made our original investment," said MTG President and CEO Jørgen Madsen Lindemann. "We have got to know the talented InnoGames team very well over the past six months and are impressed with the strategy, culture, performance and management of the business."
MTG described the games business as an "increasingly important area" in its future plans. As the owner of DreamHack and the majority stakeholder in ESL, it is already a significant force in the emerging eSports scene. However, MTG referred to InnoGames as the "first step" in establishing a new vertical for the company.
InnoGames earned €130 million in revenue in calendar 2016, up 25% over the previous year - the third consecutive year that it has increased revenue by 20% or more. The driver of that growth has been the successful transition from browser games to mobile, a process with which other German publishers have struggled.