India's Nazara pays Rs 228 crore in cash to acquire London-based Fusebox Games

Mumbai-based gaming and esports company Nazara Technologies has acquired London-based gaming studio Fusebox Games for Rs 228 crore ($27.2 million) in an all-cash transaction.

The development comes after Nazara Tech subsidiary Absolute Sports announced the acquisition of all assets of DeltiasGaming.com.

The acquisition was aimed at bolstering its footprint in the gaming and esports media sector in the United States. Additionally, Nazara's another subsidiary Nextwave Multimedia finalised the acquisition of the casual freemium card game, Ultimate Teen Patti (UTP).

What does Fusebox Games do?

Fusebox is a mobile free-to-play studio that specializes in interactive story games. The studio publishes a popular interactive story game ‘Love Island’ and is developing new games based on popular global TV IPs.

It operates IP driven interactive story games that are primarily monetized through inapp purchases, which accounted for ~92% of the total revenues in YTD July’24.

Targets developed markets 

Fusebox primarily target developed markets including US, UK, Australia and Canada, Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, New Zealand among others.

The company has 30 employees primary based in the United Kingdom.

“We see a large opportunity in building an IP based global gaming business that benefits from our core base in India where we can support global studios through enhanced user acquisition strategies, data analytics, live operations and new initiatives such as implementing our in-house AI playbook," said Nitish Mittersain, Founder & CEO of Nazara Technologies.

"Many of our existing IP’s are good examples of this strategy and we are happy to join forces with the talented team at Fusebox as we continue to build Nazara into a global gaming company of meaningful scale," Mittersain added.

Fusebox Games' financial performance 

In CY23, the Fusebox reported revenues of Rs 87.5 crore ($10.4 million) with an EBITDA of Rs 11.7 crore ($1.4 million).

During CY24, the company demonstrated strong growth with YTD revenues (Jan - July’24) at Rs 116.6 crore ($13.9 million) with an EBITDA of ~Rs 33.3 crore (EBITDA of $4.0 million).