Playtika set to acquire social gaming studio Pacific Interactive
Deal to take House of Fun developer under Playtika stable is imminent following months of negotiations
Caesars Interactive is set to acquire House of Fun developers Pacific Interactive with a deal imminent through its social gaming Playtika subsidiary, eGaming Review understands.
The deal, which has been on the table for several months, will see Caesars Interactive bolster its market-leading social casino portfolio, which already includes Playtika brand Slotomania, Buffalo Studios’ Bingo Blitz and its own Caesars Casino product.
While a fee has yet to be disclosed, it is believed to be larger than the figure paid for Buffalo Studios and boutique research firm Eilers Research estimates the fee to be between $60-90m.
Adam Krejcik, managing director of Eilers Research, said that the deal would further strengthen Caesars’ position in the social casino industry.
“We believe this deal puts the onus on other leading social game publishers such as IGT/DoubleDown, Zynga, Williams Interactive and Game Show Network to further evaluate M&A opportunities,” Krejcik said.
eGR understands that any deal is unlikely to see any major changes to the team behind House of Fun with with former IGT and WMS content specialists having been recruited in recent months and Playtika is reportedly keen to keep the team together.
Pacific Interactive’s House of Fun social casino game, which is available on Facebook and across multiple mobile devices, boasts monthly active users (MAU) of around 3.1 million.
Since acquiring Playtika for around $80m in 2011 Slotomania and Caesars Casino products have grown to MAUs of 4.2 million and 2.6 million respectively and has received glowing praise from within the industry for both its app ratings and monetisation rates.
Dystillr ranks Slotomania and Caesars Casino at third and eleventh in its social casino Facebook leader board, with the former in particular mounting a strong challenge to DoubleDown Casino’s second place.
House of Fun’s rapid growth has attracted a great deal of attention over the past 12 months, and the company scooped the Social Casino Product of the Year prize at last year’s eGaming Review Operator of the Year awards.
A spokesperson for Caesars declined to comment on this story.