Online casino games can be enjoyed in a variety of ways. Gamblers can log on to their favorite casino and play games for money or choose a free play option. Most players want to try and earn a cash prize, so the real money option is the obvious choice. New players will try the free play games to get a sense of what casino gaming is all about. Because players are willing to enjoy free play games, social casinos have taken big strides, becoming as popular as online casinos themselves.
With social gaming, players have the option to enjoy slot gaming, table games and poker via social casinos or social media sites. These games can be enjoyed for fun or offer prizes such as vouchers for merchandise, club points, etc. GSN Games is a provider of social gaming options, owned by the Sony Company. The brand recently acquired their rival to begin to expand their social gaming options in the United Kingdom.
Taking on Plumbee, GSN Games will have more opportunity to provide casino gaming on a social scale. GSN acquired 100% of Plumbee’s equity, at an undisclosed sum, and announced the acquisition today. Plumbee is a gaming company best known for creating the application titled Mirrorball Slots, which was downloaded via Facebook and mobile devices more than 10 million times.
The Mirrorball Slot application was shut down in March of last year after the product did gain traction like Plumbee had originally thought it would. Plumbee and GSN are part of the social casino market which offers mobile gaming and earned $3.3 billion in revenues last year.
GSN Chief Operating Officer, Steve Brunell, commented on the acquisition by stating that the change will immediately bolster GSN Games’ ambitious growth plans by allowing the company to leverage the top talent and social casino expertise of Plumbee. The acquisition will be used to create best-in-class winning experiences for GSN Players. The company is excited to expand their brand into the United Kingdom and hope to capitalize on the high concentration of gaming talent that will supplement the outstanding Plumbee team.
The GSN Games group has a staff of 525 members and will take on 44 employees of Plumbee to help continue the expansion into the UK. GSN will now have seven locations around the world, including offices in London, Palo Alto, Boston, Washington DC, San Francisco, Zaporozhe and Bangalore.
The CEO of Plumbee, Raf Keustermans, also commented on the company being acquired by GSN by stating that Plumbee is delighted to join GSN Games, which is a growing force in the social casino space and ranks as a top five publisher in the world. The company looks forward to adding to the existing scale of GSN in such areas as art, product management, engineering, marketing and analytics. The fusion of both companies will do well to create an industry-leading experience in social casino gaming.
GSN has been busy when it comes to acquiring companies in the genre of social gaming. In 2015, GSN took on Idle Gaming, which was the developer of such content as the Slots of Fun and Fresh Deck Poker games.
Social gaming is taking the forefront, especially when it comes to young people enjoying casino style gaming. Many young people feel that casinos are for the older generation and social casinos are offering casino style gaming in a fun setting, which can be more appealing than the standard casino game. GSN will certainly gain a further foothold in the industry by taking on Plumbee, stretching their reach further into the UK and beyond.
