Description
Playtika is a digital entertainment company that specializes in the development and publication of free to play mobile games. The company has over 30 million monthly active users playing its game titles.
History
The company was founded in 2010 by Robert Antokol and Uri Shahak. In May 2011, the company was bought by Caesars Entertainment Corporation. Antokol remained the CEO of Playtika, and the company remained an independent unit within Caesars.
In July 2016, the company's operations were acquired by a Chinese consortium, valued at 4.4 billion dollars.
Partnership and initiatives
Headquartered in Herzliya, Israel, the company has over three thousand employees in offices worldwide including Tel-Aviv, London, Berlin, Vienna, Helsinki, Montreal, Chicago, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Santa Monica, Sydney, Buenos Aires, Tokyo, Kyiv, Bucharest, Minsk, Dnipro, and Vinnytsia.
Playtika started off in the casino-style genre of "Social Casino Games". This genre uses the central elements of popular casino games but players cannot use real cash within the gameplay, nor can they win real money. In lieu of a possible cashout, players play Social Casino games solely for their entertainment value and so to maintain their engagement, Playtika focused on creating rich layers of constantly evolving content on top of the core game mechanic.
At January 2018, Playtika set up a $400 million Israel investment fund. The fund plans to invest in Israeli mobile and Internet digital entertainment and consumer product companies.
In October 2017, Playtika made its first foray into the casual games' genre with its acquisition of the Israeli-based games studio, Jelly Button. In December 2018, the company took another step in its new diversification strategy with the acquisition of Berlin-based casual games studio, Wooga. In January 2019, the company acquired a Vienna-based casual games studio, Super treat.
In May 2019, the company launched an independent division dedicated to the creation and rapid development of casual games which plans to launch several new games every year.
The announcement introducing the new independent division was made at the company's Global Summit in Ibiza, where over 2,500 employees from Playtika's 16 locations around the world gathered for a company event.
In August 2019, Playtika acquired Finnish mobile game company Seriously, publisher of Best Fiends, a cartoon-style mobile game that launched in 2014.
In March 2020, Playtika will donate its catered meals and food to local communities to provide relief for the COVID-19 pandemic.
