Yesterday, September 26, AppLovin announced the sale of a controlling stake in the private Chinese investment company Orient Hontai Capital for $1.4 billion. We talked to Russian marketing companies about the deal.
The fact that this year has become the leader in M&A in the gaming market is not news to anyone. But can we say that this transaction marks the beginning of major mergers and acquisitions in the social and mobile marketing market?
Dmitry Semenov – CEO of Unilead
The deal is really big.
But there have already been similar deals, let’s recall Yahoo (the purchase of the Flurry service company). However, Chinese companies have declared their claims to the world market with this transaction. If a couple of years ago they were mainly focused on their market, today this is far from the case.
Mikhail Prytkov – VP of Advertising at Datalead
This transaction is quite noticeable and attracts interest, but to say that it will entail a lot of other transactions is quite unreasonable.
Many Chinese companies began to actively engage in M&A a couple of years ago, but transactions do not occur and do not close quickly. I am sure that many more interesting purchases are coming, which we will learn about in the near future.
Alexey Pisarevsky – Managing Director of Mobio
In general, this is not quite the beginning.
Before that, there were already deals such as Smaato, NativeX or Fiksu, although, of course, not so large. I would say that consolidation in this market is already in full swing, and further mergers and acquisitions will be even more
What deals do you think should be expected in the near future?
Dmitry Semenov – CEO of Unilead
I think that Chinese companies will behave actively in terms of M&A of American and European companies.
I think they will be aimed not so much at advertising businesses like AppLovin, but mainly at analytics, data, services with a large active audience.
Mikhail Prytkov – VP of Advertising at Datalead
It is clear that China has not been able to successfully enter Western markets on its own and they will need strong companies that will be able to open this opportunity to them.
Therefore, I am sure that Chinese companies will continue to invest money in the purchase of serious food companies in the market.
Alexey Pisarevsky – Managing Director of MobioWe are definitely waiting for a wave of purchases of video and native mobile advertising networks – companies with direct access to traffic will buy.
How will this affect the market of social and mobile games? Plus, given that sites like Steam and G2A have now started resorting to advertising on Facebook, how will this affect them?
Dmitry Semenov – CEO of Unilead
I don’t think that M&A will have much impact on the market of social and mobile games/applications.
But, in general, it’s good for the industry. This is not just a big investment in the industry, but also a good incentive for young companies. AppLovin is a great example for the whole market.
Mikhail Prytkov – VP of Advertising at Datalead
Competition for users is growing, so more and more companies will use a variety of tools that allow them to get these users.
I don’t think this purchase will somehow affect the gaming market.
Alexey Pisarevsky – Managing Director of Mobio
I think that market consolidation is definitely good for end customers.
The market is maturing, becoming more transparent. When most of the budgets become concentrated among the leading players, budgets are much easier to manage.
You will be able to learn about the latest trends in the gaming industry first-hand, personally meet and discuss working issues with leading companies in the game development and publishing market at White Nights Moscow 2016, which will be held on October 11-12.