Neil Young, the CEO of ngmoco, the company behind popular iPhone games such as TouchPets and Eliminate had recently announced that his company has acquired Freeverse, another popular iPhone gaming startup well-known for their apps like Skee-Ball, Flick Fishing and Moto Chaser.
This comes in the backdrop of a $25 million series C funding that ngmoco closed recently, which brings the total capital raised by the company so far to $40.6 million.
Speaking on the development, Neil Young told TechCrunch that the new round of investments would help the company "amass enough scale to accelerate away from the pack". However, Young insisted that Freeverse would continue to function separately for the time being and retain its independent brand identity.
The past one year has been extremely eventful for ngmoco as the company changed its core monetization model for its games. Most of ngmoco's games including Eliminate and Touch Pets Dogs that were earlier offered as paid applications are now available for free download with revenues made via in-app purchases.
Young explains that one of the important reasons behind this move was to cater to the large pool of customers who participated in only the free-download section of the App Store. The strategy, he says, could thus help them reach out to that section of the audience who may otherwise never be exposed to ngmoco's pool of applications. Young further stated that the company now sees close 2% of its users making in-app purchases on any given day.
Speaking on the company's future plans, Young revealed that the acquisition of Freeverse could help the company launch close to 40 new games this year. Additionally, ngmoco shall also be rolling out an SDK for its Plus+ system that will enable other iPhone app developers make use of their in-house technology for activities like virtual goods payment and player-to-player messaging.
It is amazing how companies have spawned out thanks to the iPhone app economy and raised multi-million dollar funding. This is further testament to the promise and success that the app economy has offered. What are your thoughts on this?
[via TechCrunch, TouchArcade]
Comments: