According to the Serbian Gaming Association (SGA), there are 3,400 registered game developers in the country by the end of 2023. This is 98% more than it was a year earlier. At that time, there were 1,700 specialists in the local industry.
Moreover, according to SGA estimates, by April 2024, the number of gaming professionals in Serbia had already jumped to 4,300 people.
Such rapid growth in the association is explained by the active relocation of gaming specialists from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus to the country. At the end of last year, 48% of the personnel employed in the local industry were foreigners.
Remark: this is not recorded in the report, but it is important to say that the specialists who have arrived are not included in the local industry yet. They either continue to work remotely in Russian-speaking companies, or work in the recently launched local offices of those studios that were previously founded in the CIS.
For context: companies such as Wargaming, Playrix and Sperasoft now have some of the largest offices in Serbia.
At the same time, the number of companies registered in the country has not increased significantly. If a year earlier SGA had 140 game studios, then this year their number reached 150.
60% of them plan to expand this year. In total, they want to attract 475 gaming specialists in 2024.