The future for Crowdpark is looking a lot brighter than it did in July when the startup filed for insolvency, with today’s release of two of its Facebook games on mobile. Pet Vegas Mobile and AnteUp Mobile will enable to company to mix the markets of social gaming, online gambling and mobile gaming.
And in another boost to the Berlin-based firm, its insolvency administrator has insisted that he is “confident that there will be a favorable outcome for Crowdpark.”
It was a major shock to the Berlin scene when Crowdpark, which was founded in 2009 and had attracted a total of $8 million in funding, ran into trouble last month. At the time, CEO Martin Frindt told Silicon Allee that the company was functioning as normal despite the insolvency, and now preliminary insolvency administrator Thomas Kühn of Brinkmann & Partner is working together with the founding management team and M&A advisory firm Advantum Corporate Finance to ‘steer the international investment and acquisition process.’
He said: “Crowdpark has a highly qualified team and great technology… We have seen much interest from potential investors and acquirers in our initial discussions. I am confident that there will be a favorable outcome for Crowdpark.”
And with the ‘business as usual’ attitude in mind, Crowdpark has taken another step into mobile with today’s launch. With casino games proving to be amongst the highest revenue generators on Facebook and in the App Store, adding the functionality of mobile devices, the company believes, will take its portfolio of games to the next level.
“Crowdpark feels that it is essential to maximize social games’ potential by pursuing a cross-platform strategy, capitalizing on cross-marketing and seamless play on multiple devices,” said Martin Frindt. “Mobile and Facebook are synergistic platforms allowing for heightened gamer satisfaction.”
There is certainly a large market to be tapped – according to a report produced by Crowdpark, the social games industry is projected to hit $8 billion in 2012, while online gambling produced gross revenues in excess of $32 billion in 2011. By pursuing a cross-platform strategy, mobile social casino games developers can also tap into the mobile gaming market, which was worth $2.72 billion in 2011.
Crowdpark was founded by Martin and his co-founders Christoph Jenke and Ingo Hinterding and investors include Target Partners and Earlybird, which led last year’s $6 million Series B round.
