Melbourne-headquartered gaming company PlaySide Studios made its ASX debut on Thursday, making it the largest locally grown game development firm to float on the Australian Stock Market.
PlaySide is valued at $73 million with a 20c share issue price and is the largest non-gambling stock to join the ASX.
The company was founded in 2012 after its chief executive Gerry Sakkas was made redundant at EA Games and used his $15000 payout to build a gaming studio.
According to the Australian Financial Review, the Australian company is focussing on making quality mobile games and monetising it through development contracts, in-app purchases and in-game advertising.
“We are really a business first company. We do make games, we are extremely passionate about making games, but we are extremely focused on making money. And that’s how we’re going to grow,” Sakkas told the publication.
“I guess from the outside looking in, we’re not just game developers coming up with game ideas, we really are working with Hollywood, speaking with them every day, and pitching for big contracts.”
During 2020, PlaySide Studios posted a revenue of $7.7 million, which was up 56% on the 2019 financial year and the company employs 80 staff.
PlaySide had 42,000 daily active users across its apps at the end of 2020, up 30% on the previous year, and 698,000 monthly active users.
During its first year, PlaySide made the popular game Catch The Ark, which netted Disney and Nickelodeon as early paying clients.
It has since produced games for the Jumanji, Lego Batman, Cars and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movies.
Another game, AR Dragon, has also been featured on Apple devices in stores around the world to show Apple’s future of gaming.
In the future, PlaySide will aim to enter the esports and augmented reality market to help bolster its mobile gaming base.
