Mumbai: Digital entertainment and technology company, Jetsynthesys has launched invest and operate (I&O) gaming startup ‘Jetapult’ which has announced its first acquisition. In the next 8-9 months, the company plans to invest $100 million in acquiring gaming studios with strong growth potential.
Jetapult will be led by Sharan Tulsiani, whose previous experience includes leading gaming at Google Play Asia – India and ANZ markets, along with their Indie Games Accelerator (IGA). Apart from Tulsiani, the team also comprises Yash Baid (COO) and Mangesh Anaokar.
Baid was previously principal and head of research at 3one4 Capital and partner at 256 Network. Anaokar has extensive M&A (mergers and acquisition) and investment experience having led investments and portfolio management at Bennett, Coleman and Co.
The team is further bolstered by veteran industry experts and advisors like Ryo Shima (ex-COO GREE), James Cho (ex-Blizzard, Bethesda, Zynga), Angelo Lobo (ex-director Zynga), Dennis Sullivan (ex-Wargaming) and Hyunsu Bang (ex-GREE).
Jetapult will focus on acquiring and scaling revenue-generating Indie game development studios across emerging markets like India, South-East Asia, the Middle East, South America as well as Australia, and New Zealand, to fill a dearth of long-term smart capital in the industry.
Moreover, the start-up will create and grow an exciting roster of gaming companies commercially from a local market setting to an international perspective for a scientific and sustainable scale.
“Over the years, we have seen the gaming industry pick up steam, and the road ahead looks brighter than ever. There are several talented gaming studios with great ideas who can truly scale themselves with the right mentorship and funding,” said JetSynthesys VC and MD Rajan Navani. “Recognizing this market need, we decided to launch Jetapult on the back of JetSynthesys’ very successful model of acquiring and rapidly scaling gaming studios using global expertise and world-class partnerships. With the three-pronged approach of Acquire, Invest, Accelerate, Jetapult is all ready to come out of stealth now, having already made one crucial acquisition. Built on the Invest and Operate (I&O) model, we believe Jetapult will be a game-changer in the industry. With an expert team that has a collective experience spanning decades, the start-up will strengthen Indian gaming’s position on the global map further.”
“Building high grossing hits in the gaming industry are often misrepresented to be luck-based, coin-flip endeavours. This cannot be further from the truth.,” said Jetapult CEO and co-founder Sharan Tulsiani. “Making games is a passionately creative endeavour, but scaling them intrinsically is a scientific one. This was a hypothesis taken on and solved with tremendous success at the biggest distribution platform for gaming, Google Play Store. The systematic acceleration programs like the Google Global Indie Games Accelerator and others that I created were a product of this sustainable scale challenge. Our key learning was that supporting genius designers in small studios requires a village of supplemental expertise across domains like game and economy design, product and engineering, user acquisition, etc. Witnessing the multi-fold successes coming out of these programs, I felt very motivated to scale these advisory frameworks that didn’t reach enough in the vast but talented gaming industry.”
He further said, “The Jetapult I&O model will democratise gaming expertise and open opportunities at scale by partnering with talented studios in emerging markets. Helping them implement foundational frameworks and scientific-decision making will catalyse the long-term growth of the studios, its teams, and revenues.”
“Investment leaders are well aware of the stellar investment returns that game studios offer, which even benefits from economic downturns, as was witnessed during Covid. However, there is a severe dearth of smart capital and meaningful support for these studios in the industry today,” said Jetapult COO and co-founder Yash Baid. “Jetapult is a product of years of working closely with game studio developers to identify their requirements and create access to smart and patient capital, scaled by partnering with marquee venture equity and debt investors. We are built to keep small gaming studios at the centre of our operational ethos and aim to grow them into generational companies out of emerging markets like India.”
Jetapult’s key selection criteria for acquiring a gaming studio would be its growth potential, presence of a strong team and revenue generation along with a review of the games they make, a genre they are following, and capacity of growth for the team.
The startup is in the process of bringing capital and top gaming industry leaders across free-to-play game design, product management, user acquisition, and analytics to its portfolio of gaming studios.
