In early September, the Indian authorities blocked 118 Chinese applications, including PUBG Mobile. Now analysts are arguing about the future of the country’s gaming market. While some argue that the fate of India’s industry is under threat, others see new opportunities in this.
The opinions of analysts were shared by the Indian news site about Gadgets 360 technologies. According to the portal, PUBG entered the Indian market recently — in March 2018. The game quickly won the hearts of gamers, and then business: thanks to the Tencent title, various esports organizations came to the country and local gaming startups appeared.
Now PUBG has been forced to leave India. It is unclear how soon the game will return and whether it will return at all, although the owner of the franchise — the South Korean PUBG Corporation — is trying to find workarounds. Representatives of the Indian gaming business and analytical companies gave forecasts about the future of the country’s games market without PUBG and about the future of the game itself.
Analysts
Sensor Tower
According to analysts from Sensor Tower, the publisher of the game is unlikely to feel the consequences of the ban in India, but the country’s gaming market may change for the better.
PUBG’s performance in India seems impressive at first glance. According to Sensor Tower, the number of downloads of the title was 185 million, and its lite version PUBG Mobile Lite was downloaded 92.4 million times. Moreover, 24% of downloads of these games in the App Store and Google Play originate from India. However, with the help of the title, Tencent earned only $43 million here — this is 1% of PUBG Mobile’s global revenue ($3.5 billion).
But Sensor Tower clarifies that the authorities have banned not only PUBG, but also other Chinese applications. This is not the best news for companies from China, but other publishers have a chance to attract tens of millions of players. For example, Call of Duty: Mobile and Free Fire shooters have already felt the increased attention from Indian players.
Niko Partners
Daniel Ahmad, a senior analyst at the company, predicts that the Indian market will suffer greatly due to the large-scale blocking of games.
“We think banning Chinese apps will do more harm than good as it will have a significant impact on both the players and India,” Ahmad says. “This will not only stop the investment of Chinese companies. Global investors may also find investing in India too risky.”
Representatives of esports
NODWIN Gaming
The managing director of NODWIN Gaming Akshat Rathee draws attention to the gaming community itself. From his point of view, many games will try to replace PUBG, but it will not be easy for them to keep the audience.
The Esports Club
According to Ishaan Arya, co-founder of The Esports Club esports platform, most of the investments in Indian esports have been concentrated around PUBG. Therefore, the ban of PUBG will hurt such organizations and athletes.
Trinity Gaming
Trinity Gaming Managing Director Abhishek Aggarwal agrees with the position of The Esports Club. He also assumes that in the near future the number of viewers among esports players will decrease by 10-20%.
But at the same time, Aggarwal hopes for the best and believes that banning the game will allow Indian esports to pay attention to something else besides PUBG, and some publishers and developers will have the opportunity to make themselves known more loudly.
“A vacuum was created, but the gaming industry found a way out of any vacuum. It can be negative and positive.”
Entity Gaming
CEO Neerav Rukhana states that due to the current situation, the audience of esports tournaments will decrease. Nevertheless, he also expects that things will get better over time.
“Our partners did not invest in PUBG Mobile. They invested in Entity Gaming, which is part of the entire Indian market,” Ruhana clarifies. “If you look at the situation as a whole, it’s more about games and esports in India, with which they want to cooperate. [Banning PUBG] will disrupt the normal flow of partnerships, but it all depends on how we look at it in the long term.”
Also on the topic:
- 118 Chinese apps blocked in India, including PUBG MobilePUBG Corporation revoked the rights to the PUBG Mobile franchise in India from Tencent
- PUBG Mobile’s revenue for the last two months amounted to $500 million
- FAU authors:G: “Our game is not a clone of PUBG Mobile”
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