Mobile advertising and publishing platform Tapjoy today announced a partnership with South Korea’s largest social mobile platform Kakao, which will allow developers on the Kakao Games platform to monetize with Tapjoy’s advertising and monetization tools.

The Kakao Games platform allows users to play with KakaoTalk users, share game scores, and compete on leaderboards in real-time. Games on the platform now gross more than $40 million per month, the company revealed in a statment.

In March, Tapjoy revealed that approximately 100 million unique viewers who come through its network per month are international, which equates to about 75 percent of its overall unique viewers per month coming from outside the U.S.

The partnership provides Tapjoy the opportunity to deliver premium content within titles on the Kakao Games platform.

KakaoTalk currently has more than 90 million users around the globe, more than 30 million users visiting the platform every day and is South Korea’s practically ubiquitous mobile messaging app. SundayToz was the first developer to get its match-3 puzzler Anipang on KakaoTalk’s game platform. At GDC 2013, SundayToz founder and CEO Kevin Lee told us he spoke with the founder of Kakao, and proposed the idea to turn the messenger app into a game platform, which led to the launch of Anipang for Kakao. Today, Anipang is generating around $500,000 in revenue a day.

Recently, KakaoTalk also demonstrated growth outside of its native South Korea by surpassing the 10 million download mark in Japan on March 24.

Mobile-social gaming giant GREE today reported 37.9 billion yen ($370.9 million) in revenue and 10.8 billion yen ($105.7 million) in operating profit for the third quarter of 2013, a quarter-over-quarter decline of both sales and profits. Sales fell 4 percent and profits 24 percent. Year-over-year, revenues are down 18 percent from 46.2 billion yen ($452.1 million) in Q3 2012 and operating profit dipped by 56 percent from 24.5 billion yen ($239.7 million).

The Japanese company, which was established in 2004, also posted an “extraordinary” loss of 4.03 billion yen (39.4 million) on one-time write-off of assets related to some titles. The loss was part of GREE’s plans to shift growth strategy to “selection” and “concentration”, where it will streamline its portfolio of core titles. Card battle titles from Pokelabo, the Japanese game studio GREE acquired in October 2012, are performing well for GREE. Three of the top 25 grossing iOS apps in Japan include Guardian Battle of Glory at No. 7, Sword of Phantasia at No. 10 and Clan Battle of Fate at No. 25. GREE also plans to share its successful Android lessons with Pokelabo, while Pokelabo plans to do the same for GREE with iOS lessons. (more…)

Japanese mobile-social gaming juggernaut GREE recently laid off around 30 employees from its San Francisco office, according to GameIndustry International.

“We have recently aligned GREE’s U.S. studio to focus on creating the next generation of mobile social games,” said Anil Dharni, chief operating officer of GREE, in an official statement. “This shift in focus has been clearly demonstrated by the success and growth of our games. As part of ensuring that we are operating as efficiently as possible, we have made the difficult decision to reduce our work force. The employees leaving today have made great contributions to our success and we wish them all the best.”

In December 2012, GREE restructured its company, letting go 25 people, mostly from GREE’s social networking platform OpenFeint team. GREE announced the closing of OpenFeint a month prior to the layoffs. GREE acquired OpenFeint in April 2011 for $104 million as part of the Japanese company’s efforts to expand into Western markets.

Stay tuned to Inside Mobile Apps for GREE’s Q3 2013 earnings tomorrow.

Korean mobile game developer and publisher earlier this week reported record quarterly revenue of 24.9 billion KRW ($22.8 million) in Q1 2013, up 17 percent quarter-over-quarter and 121 percent year-over-year. Profit improved tremendously as well, where in the company saw 8.6 billion KRW ($7.9 million) in profit for the quarter, an increase of 184 percent quarter-over-quarter and 120 percent year-over-year.

Mobile revenues domestically (South Korea) were up 34 percent quarter-on-quarter and 274 percent year-over-year at 18.3 billion KRW ($16.8 million). Com2uS cited games on messaging app KakaoTalk’s game platform as a key driver to the revenue increase. Sales overseas were down 18 percent quarter-over-quarter but up 1 percent year-over-year at 5.4 billion KRW ($4.9 million). Com2uS explained that most new titles launch first on KakaoTalk then overseas, where the platform doesn’t exist. The company plans to expand to more markets around the globe in Q2 2013.

A standout title for the company, in terms of revenue, was its recently launched strategy RPG title Heroes War, which is seeing stable revenue growth.

In total, Com2uS launch six titles in Q1 and plans to release 16 titles in Q2 2013. Com2uS didn’t update its earnings forecast for 2013, meaning its sticking with its expected 101.7 billion KRW ($93.2 million) in revenue and 41.1 billion KRW ($22.1 million) in profit.

Japanese mobile-social gaming juggernaut DeNA today reported 52.3 billion yen (approximately $528 million) in revenue for its fourth quarter of 2013, a 22 percent increase year-over-year, while operating profit rose 3 percent from the same quarter of the previous year to 18.2 billion yen ($184 million). For the 2012 fiscal year, the company set a new earnings records with revenues of 202.5 billion yen ($2.04 billion) and 76.8 billion yen ($775 million) in operating profit, up 38 and 28 percent respectively.

“DeNA’s full-year revenues and operating profits increased for the ninth consecutive year, representing growth every year since the company went public,” said Isao Moriyasu, President and CEO of DeNA, in a statement. “We will continue to pursue aggressive growth worldwide for our mobile internet business, especially in the mobile-social games sector.” (more…)

Capcom today reported net sales of 94.1 billion yen ($952.8 million) and 3 billion yen ($30.4 million) in net income for the 2013 fiscal year, which ended March 31, 2013. Compared to the Japanese gaming company’s yearly results in 2012, net income was down in 2013 by 55.8 percent and net sales were up 14.6 percent.

Notable mobile games included Minna to Monhan Card Master, which is distributed on DeNA’s mobile-social gaming network Mobage, continued to show growth, citing the increase in smartphone market penetration as the growth driver. Resident Evil: Outbreak Survive on Japanese mobile-social gaming giant GREE’s platform continuously acquired new users. Both titles “enjoyed membership” eclipsing two million each. Mobile game developer and publisher Beeline’s Smurf’s Village “has securely built stable sales over a long range.”

Capcom’s digital content business, which includes console, mobile and social games businesses, posted revenues of 63.6 billion yen ($644.3 million), a 6.4 percent uptick year-over-year, while operating income fell significantly year-over-year by 45.2 percent to 7.1 billion yen ($71.5 million).

Capcom estimates 97 billion yen ($982.1 million) in net sales and 12 billion yen ($121.5 million) in operating income for the next fiscal year ending March 31, 2014. The company plans to achieve its forecast by directing its development resources to the development of online games (mobile, PC online and downloads for consumer games), which is a growing area, and by launching major titles such as Monster Hunter 4 and Lost Planet 3 focused on the domestic and overseas markets respectively. (more…)

Mobile game developer and publisher Glu Mobile today reported total non-GAAP (generally accepted accounting principles) smartphone revenues of $17.1 million for Q1 2013, falling by 7.6 percent from Q4 2012′s $18.5 million, and by 1.7 percent from Q1 2012′s $17.4 million. iOS and Android accounted for 91 percent of Glu’s smartphone revenue, marginally down from 92 percent in Q4 2012.

Glu also cut staff yesterday in an effort to reduce the number of its development studio teams and eliminate certain research and development positions. The reduction in staff was equivalent to circa 12 percent of this year’s starting headcount of 564 employees. Glu also made this decision to enable it to hire additional monetization, live operations, server technology, user experience and product management personnel to support Glu’s transition to becoming a games-as-a-service (GaaS) company. Glu plans to bring headcount up to 580 by year’s end. Restructuring will complete no later than June 30, 2013. Glu did just hire Chris Arkhavan as president of publishing, who is focusing on growing advertising revenues, increasing direct marketing efficiencies and overseeing third-party publishing.

“Our goal is to shift headcount out of raw studio team volume and into our GaaS functions,” says Niccolo de Masi, CEO of Glu Mobile, in today’s earnings call.

The company’s total revenue for the first quarter of 2013 was $19.0 million, down 12 percent from $21.6 million in Q1 2012, and fell 8.7 percent quarter-over-quarter from total revenue of $20.8 million in Q4 2012. Non-GAAP operating loss was $2.2 million in Q1 2013 compared to Q1 2012′s $23,000 and Q4 2012′s $2.5 million. Glu’s non-GAAP net loss was $2.3 million in Q1 2013, resulting in a non-GAAP earnings per share (EPS) loss of $0.03.

“I’m pleased with the moentization progress we made in Q1 and the steps we are taking to maintain this momentum,” de Masi says.

The San Francisco-headquartered game studio released seven freemium games in Q1 — Dragon Storm, Stardom: Hollywood, Gun Bros 2, Small City, Samurai vs. Zombies Defense 2, Heroes of Destiny, and Frontline Commando: D-Day. Titles released in Q1 2013 accounted for 16 percent ($2.66 million) of non-GAAP smartphone revenue this past quarter. Glu now plans to launch 12 first-party titles in 2013, with five already out. In March, Glu, in partnership with mobile gambling service Probability PLC, launched its first real-money game title Samurai vs. Zombies Defense Slots for the web in the U.K. Glu also announced today’s launch of another slots game in partnership with Probability with Contract Killer Slots in the U.K. Lastly, Glu began development on a Glu-IP-branded mobile casino suites game, which is expected to launch in the U.K. by Q3 2013.

Daily active users (DAU) rose from 3.5 million in Q4 2012 to 3.9 million in Q1 2013. Monthly active users (MAU) also increased, moving from 34.8 million in Q4 2012 to 40.1 million in Q1 2013.

In Q1 2013, Glu’s average revenue per daily active user (ARPDAU) was 6.4 cents, down from 6.7 cents in Q4 2012. The average for the percentage of MAU converting to paid users stood still at 0.7 percent. Stardom: The A List once again had the highest ARPDAU at 8.3 cents, although that figure fell from 9.1 cents in Q4 2012. The female-focused game also had the greatest conversation rate, converting 1.2 percent of MAU to paid users. Contract Killer 2 led all Glu titles again as the game with the most DAU, with 292,000 DAU. Heroes of Destiny and Dragon Storm, two Q1 2013 releases, broke Glu’s own ARPDAU records. As for Glu’s third-party publishing efforts, the game house plans to launch six titles globally by December 2013.

Glu’s most lucrative title for Q1 2013 was Eternity Warriors 2, which generated $2.1 million in non-GAAP revenue. Another notable title was Contract Killer 2, which raked in $1.8 million.

For Q2 2013, Glu estimates non-GAAP smartphone revenue between $15.2 million and $16.2 million. Glu now predicts between $80 million and $84 million in smartphone revenue for the 2013 fiscal year, down from the company’s prediction of $84 million to $88 million it provided in the Q4 2012 earnings release. As of March 31, 2013, Glu finished the quarter with a cash balance of $21.2 million and no debt.

Glu’s stock price dipped 7 cents after the release of its earnings report to $3.01 per share, with a market cap of $200.5 million. In after hours trading, the stock dropped even more to $2.90.

Mobile game developer and publisher Pocket Gems today released a case study about its publishing program, where the company explained its publishing philosophy and process. It’s first two published games — Chasing Yello for Android and Amazing Ants for iOS — both saw more than two million installs in the first two weeks of its respective releases.

The purpose of the case study was to review the first two games Pocket Gems published and to share some information on how the games performed as well as more on the publishing process between Pocket Gems and the indie developers. Future developers can get a better sense as to how Pocket Gems works with developers, since many have asked Pocket Gems how its publishing process works.

“We had on our website that this is the general process, but here we can say here’s what we did with the first developers we worked with and get a better sense of what it actually looks like,” says Jameel Khalfan, who oversees publishing efforts for Pocket Gems.

The San Francisco-headquartered game studio, which was founded in 2009, first announced that it was adding a publishing side to its business in December 2012. The development house had revealed three games from indie developers it was publishing so far. The first game published by Pocket Gems was endless swimmer game Chasing Yello for Android in December 2012 from German developer Dreamfab and Danish developer Tactile Entertainment. The second title was Twyngo’s Lemmings-like puzzler Amazing Ants for iOS in January. Pocket Gems’ third announced title that was part of its initial publishing deal was we.R.play’s robot action title RoboQuest for iOS, which has yet to release. Khalfan says the game will launch “soon.”

Khalfan reiterated what CEO Ben Liu told Inside Mobile Apps last year, saying Pocket Gems didn’t believe there were any good publishing options for developers, so that’s why the company decided to fill that void.

“We only publish games that we love from a small group developers,” Khalfan says. “Our goal isn’t to go and publish a thousand games. Our goal is to find the best games and focus our time and attention on them rather than going for the shotgun approach.”

Pocket Gems helped Twyngo and Dreamfab through the entire publishing process including the design, engagement, and monetization phase, the testing phase and the launch phase. Khalfan adds that each developer Pocket Gems worked with needed help in one phase more than the other. Pocket Gems helped Twyngo decide whether it should release two versions of Amazing Ants — a light and full version — or a purely freemoim game with in-app purchase. Twyngo ultimately went with the latter. Dreamfab, which had already released Chasing Yello for iOS on its own, came to Pocket Gems for help with porting the title to Android. Due to the severe fragmentation when it comes to Android devices, Pocket Gems aided Dreamfab by telling the indie developer its best practices for which Android devices and operating system versions Dreamfab should support and not support.

“For each different game, it’s going to be a different approach from everything from the game design to the QA process to the launch and the ongoing marketing and analytics,” Khalfan says. “That’s the best approach for developers because they all want something a little bit different and they all have different skills sets, and they all have different things they are good at and things they want help on.”

Pocket Gems is now one of many major gaming giants such as DeNA, GREE, Zynga and Kabam which have invested into the publishing of third-party titles.

A fear many indie developers have when working with publishers is if their game doesn’t perform well, publishers will put less support and resources into the their game, while putting more into games that are performing well.

“We want to put in our all for every game that we publish, so that’s why we focus on a smaller set of games,” Khalfan says.

Khalfan says Pocket Gems is currently looking for more games to publish from all genres and primarily free-to-play. Developers interested in learning more about Pocket Gems’ publishing efforts can go here.

Kabam launches $50 fund to help bring Japanese games to the West – Mobile-social gaming developer Kabam told the Wall Street Journal on Monday that the company has established a $50 million fund to help bring Japanese games to Western markets. The money provided by Kabam to Japanese game developers will help with localization, translation, analytics tracking, marketing, user acquisition, retention and more. Other major gaming giants like DeNA, GREE, Zynga and Pocket Gems have all invested more and more into the publishing of third-party titles.

PlayJam delays GameStick shipments by two months – PlayJam informed Kickstarter backers of its Android-based games console GameStick that it’s delaying the shipments of the device from April to June. The delay is due to an unexpected amount of units to produce and the company’s apparently-low bank balance, which led to PlayJam changing its shipment plans for the units from air-freight to shipping via boat. Inside Mobile Apps last got its hands on the GameStick a few weeks ago during the 2013 Game Developers Conference.

Plain Vanilla lands $2.4M in second round funding – Plain Vanilla, the Icelandic game studio known for its trivia games such as Twilight QuizUp, landed $2.4 million in second round funding, which brings its total funding to $3.4 million. With the new influx in cash, Plain vanilla wants to build out its trivia games into a platform.

Wooga releases mobile-exclusive title Pocket Village – Wooga released Pocket Village this week, its first exclusively mobile title, for iOS. Inside Mobile Apps first learned about the village building sim back in February.

GREE updates MLB: Full Deck with 2013 rosters and new features – With the start of the 2013 Major League Baseball season, GREE updated its MLB: Full Deck with the 2013 rosters for all 30 MLB clubs. GREE also added new player-versus-player features, including the ability for users to accumulate points with each PVP win and gain rewards from multiple tiers. Other updates include re-designed player profiles, an improved tutorial, new live events and a fresher user interface.

Gaming giant 2K Games and game developer FIxaxis Games (known for the Sid Meier’s Civilization franchise) today announced that strategy title XCOM: Enemy Unknown is coming to iOS — iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch — by the summer.

2K and Firxais, which made the announcement at the 2013 Penny Arcade Expo East, will be bringing the entire XCOM: Enemy Unknown experience from the consoles and PC versions to iOS. The consoles and PC versions of the game hit store shelves in October 2012, and it was critically acclaimed, receiving numerous 2012 game of the year awards from the likes of GameTrailers, GiantBomb, Kotaku and MTV Multiplayer.

In XCOM: Enemy Unknown, the player is put in the shoes of a commander of a secret global military organization, named as the game title suggests, XCOM. Gameplay features include the player’s ability to oversee combat strategies and individual unit tactics, as well as base and resource management.

Earlier this week, 2K and Firaxis announced Haunted Hollow, a haunted mansion management game. Haunted Hollow is slated to release in the spring.