Facebook app developer and rival to Zynga, Wooga, which develops online social games, has raised $24m in a funding round to continue its rapid development of games.
Creator of some of Facebook’s most popular games, the company, whose name stands for ‘world of gaming’ has created games including Monster World, Diamond Dash and Bubble Island, which attract 30 million players a month.
The funding is set to be used to turbocharge Wooga’s production of new social games.
Wooga has doubled its user-base in 2011 from 14m to 30m monthly active users and has overtaken five US-based competitors to become number three on the Facebook platform.
Two years ago it launched its first free-to-play brain training game, Brain Buddies, with a small team of five and has now grown to become an international team with 85 people from 20 countries in Berlin.
Jens Begemann, Wooga’s Founder and CEO, said:”When we started the company everyone told us the competition was too intense, we would never make it, and now – two years later – we have three games in the top 20, making us the only developer besides Zynga which has more than two games in the top 20. The phenomenal growth that we have achieved is a credit to the creativity and ingenuity of our team.”
Wooga intents to use the funding to hire “the most talented artists, game designers and engineers”, according to Begemann. Its strategy for the remainder of the year is to hire two new employees per week, to grow to a team of 150 by year end.
Begemann, 34, added: “We have a ten-year vision to build one of the largest gaming companies in the world by 2020. For 40 years, computer games have been aimed primarily at young males – roughly 10 percent of the population. But we believe that playing is a core human need, and therefore we design games for 100 percent of the population. Our games attract more viewers than some of the biggest TV shows.”
Millions of users are claimed to spend an average 20 minutes a day playing Wooga’s games, and Begemann believes social gaming is about to transform the entertainment industry.
The company has built its reputation on listening to customer feedback about its games, and as a result has been rewarded with high customer loyalty.
