We continue to summarize the results of 2023 with the game teams. Next up is an interview with Alexander Bogdanov, CEO of Belka Games.
What was the year like for the company? What have you done that I would like to highlight in terms of achievements?
It's a good year for Belka. Our new project, Roger That!, has been released globally. The first results look promising. I want to say a huge thank you to the team, including the head of R&D Pasha Sudakov and the producer of the project Vlad Kuligin — the guys did a very cool job.
We have taken the first concrete steps in terms of geo-expansion. There are partners in Japan, control groups, and local creatives. We are working deeper on the localization and culturalization of projects. Thanks to Google for that — they invited me to the Global APAC Summit, which is where it all started. We believe in success and are actively working in this direction.
We started to grow again. We reached a plateau in the first half of the year, and this half we are showing good growth, and that's cool.
We also strengthened the People Operations department — Masha Iogman joined us. Thanks to her contribution, we have attracted even more cool specialists to the team. Together, we strive to develop a company culture where each employee, guided by common goals, has significant autonomy and influences the final results.
How has the situation in the gaming market changed?
I won't say anything new. The casual market continued its decline, albeit at a slow pace. Competition has grown, and it has become crowded, including due to a drop in market volumes.
I notice that there is a certain crisis of genres. Of the breakthrough and innovative in mobile, I can only mention Monopoly Go!. The guys have made a wonderful product. Otherwise, merge, match-3 — everything remains the same.
How has the market affected your genres?
The arrival of neural networks has significantly influenced: Chat-GPT, Midjourney, Copilot. Our AI department, represented by Tanya Semakina and Anton Danko, implemented neural networks in many pipelines, which allowed us to accelerate the development of new content.
What are the company's plans for next year?
In short, there are many plans.
First, we are setting an ambitious forecast for next year's revenue, including thanks to new projects that have already been released and those that are on the way.
Secondly, we especially focus on rethinking and strengthening creatives for performance marketing. We plan to fully meet the release of Google's Sandbox. Like other players in the market, we will not be able to target the audience on Android — which means that we will have to multiply our creatives.
Thirdly, our R&D team is only gaining momentum after the release of Roger That!. The guys are working on a project in a new genre for us, and maybe next year it will be released.
And we will also enjoy life — and hope that everything will get better in the world.