1）App Annie及IHS最新报告指出，2013年消费者在全球数字音乐、电影、游戏和应用中的投入增长了30%，尽管消费者在非应用型的数字游戏投入是应用投入的两倍以上（两者分别为340亿美元、160亿美元），非应用型数字游戏投入仍然相对较平稳，仅增长了1倍左右。

游戏应用投入则在2012至2013年间增长了将近3倍。

composition of digital content spend(from gamasutra)

日本和韩国游戏应用投入分别增长4.4倍和5.8倍，并且是2013年全球游戏应用投入的关键增长力量。

应用是日本目前领先的数字内容领域，在几年前就超越了韩国数字游戏投入。在前十名游戏发行商收益榜单中，日本和韩国公司占据了半数席位。

Top_mobile_publishers(from App_Annie_IHS)

2）据gamasutra报道，零售巨头亚马逊在去年5月向Kindle Fire平台的亚马逊应用商店推出自己的虚拟货币Amazon Coin，日前该公司宣布向所有Android平台推广这一服务。

Amazon Coins(from freebies2deals.com)

美国、英国和德国Android用户现在可以通过Amazon Appstore购买Amazon Coins，并在亚马逊应用商店的游戏中使用这些虚拟货币。亚马逊称这种虚拟货币是开发者“推动流量、下载量和增加盈利性的另一个机会”。

3）据《华尔街日报》报道，Kabam联合创始人及首席执行官Kevin Chou在最近采访中表示，公司目前正密切关注人们对King最近公开IPO情况的反应。

Kabam_Logo(from kabam.com)

他称Kabam在1月份进行了又一轮关于IPO的严肃讨论，公司收益增长迅速，自2012年以来一直处于盈利状态，目前公司帐户上的现金超过7000万美元。他们正积极考虑IPO事宜，但也希望在合适的时间上市，目前还没有具体的时间表。

Kabam最近公布2013年销售额超过3.6亿美元，其中有11款游戏月收益超过100万美元。

4）据gamesbrief报道，King日前向纽约证券交易所提交的IPO文件显示:

King(from game.iresearch.cn)

*King目前拥有1.28亿DAU，3.24亿MAU（截止2013年12月31日），游戏粘性将近40%。

*73%收益来自移动用户。

*King拥有1200万月付费用户，付费转化率达4%。

*公司至今仅融资900万美元，自2004年以来一直保持资金积极流通的状态。

*有一款游戏（《Candy Crush Saga》）占其总收入的78%，有三款游戏（《Candy Crush Saga》、《Pet Rescue Saga》和《Farm Heroes Saga》）在收益中占比95%。

*营销费用从2012年的5500万美元增长至2013年的3.77亿美元，在收益中占比20%。

*广告收入比例从2010年时的12%降至2013年时的1%，King在2013年第二季度取消了广告销售。

*King的北美市场份额为55%，英国占比11%，其他没有一个市场占比超过10%。

5）据gamasutra报道，Facebook日前宣布以160亿美元收购移动通信工具WhatsApp（其中有40亿为现金，120亿为Facebook股票），除此之外，Facebook还将支付价值高达30亿美元的受限制股票以便在未来4年留存WhatsApp现有员工。

facebook-whatsapp(from netzwelt.de)

Facebook旗下的Messenger应用与WhatsApp将继续保持独立运营状态，WhatsApp每月用户已超过4.5亿。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

1）Spending on mobile games jumps threefold in 2013

by Matthew Diener

Tap happy consumers triggered a 30 percent jump in spending on digital music, movies, games, and apps in 2013, with games at the spearhead the growth.

That’s according to the first ever joint study by App Annie and global market research firm IHS, with the two bodies looking to frame and contextualise the digital content market.

While spending on non-app digital games outpaced app spending by more than two-to-one ($34 billion versus $16 billion), spending on non-app digital games remained relatively flat with 1.0 times the growth.

Spending on game apps, by comparison, increased almost three times over from 2012 – 2013.

Looking east

Unsurprisingly, large gains in game app spending in both Japan and Korea – 4.4 times and 5.8 times respectively – were a key driver to the overall global growth of game app spending in the report’s 12-month period.

Apps are now the leading digital content category in Japan and might overtake digital game spending in South Korea in the years ahead, according to App Annie and IHS.

With this information in mind, it’s even less surprising that a full half of the top grossing game app publishers are based in either Japan or South Korea with GungHo Online claiming the top spot.（source：pocketgamer）

2）Amazon Coins now available on all Android platforms

By Mike Rose

Newsbrief: Last May, retail giant Amazon launched its own virtual currency, for use on the Kindle Fire Amazon Appstore. Today, the company said that Amazon Coins are now available to all Android users, and are no longer exclusive to the Kindle Fire.

Android users in the U.S., UK and Germany can now buy Amazon Coins through the Amazon Appstore, and spend the coins on games available through the Amazon store. Titles like Ridiculous Fishing and Angry Birds GO are applicable.

Why should developers care? Amazon says that this virtual currency provides “another opportunity to drive traffic, downloads and increased monetization.”（source：gamasutra）

3）Kabam ‘actively considering’ IPO as eyes turn to King

by Keith Andrew

Free-to-play specialist Kabam has claimed it has engaged in ‘serious discussions’ about a possible IPO, but the company wants to ensure the market understands the business of free-to-play games first.

Speaking with the Wall Street Journal, co-founder and CEO Kevin Chou said the firm is keeping an eye on how King’s recently unveiled IPO is received “very closely.”

A matter of understanding

“We had another very serious discussion about an IPO in our board meeting in January,” detailed Chou.

“Our revenue is growing rapidly and we have been profitable since 2012. We have over $70 million of cash in our bank account. We are at the scale, where we can actively consider an IPO. But we also want to do it when the time is right, and we don’t have a definitive timeframe yet.

“We also want to make sure that the market has a good understanding of free-to-play games.”

Elsewhere in the interview, Chou – who was recently inducted into the PocketGamer.biz Hall of Fame – stated that the company believes that “the future of gaming is the free-to-play model”, adding that it’s “clear that consumers are using smartphones and tablets that they already own to play games.”

“Gaming apps are among the most popular mobile apps,” he concluded.

“Mobile devices are affecting not only the gaming industry, but also the way people watch television shows and videos and listen to music.That has an implication for all kinds of dedicated devices such as music and video players as well as game consoles.”

Kabam recently revealed its sales in 2013 came in above $360 million, with 11 games having grossed more than $1 million in a month across the course of the year.（source：pocketgamer）

4）King: Lots of stats, new acronyms and a conversion rate of 4%

By Nicholas Lovell

Yesterday, the games industry, and indeed the wider world, was all agog at the news that King was preparing for an IPO on the New York Stock Exchange.

Here are the stats that I gleaned from the regulatory filing.

Candy Crush Saga has 93 million DAUs

The other games have impressive DAUs although they are dwarfed by CCS (Pet Rescue Saga: 15m DAUs, Farm Heroes Saga: 8m DAUs, Papa Pear Saga: 5m DAUs, Bubble Witch Saga: 3 million DAUs)

King has 128m DAUs and 324m MAUs (31/12/2013), an engagement ratio of nearly 40%.

The 128m DAUs play 1.2 billion games a day. It is not clear if that is 1.2 billion sessions, or 1.2 billion levels.

73% of revenue comes from a mobile audience

King has 12 million monthly payers, representing a 4% conversion rate.

The company has only raised $9m million and has been cashflow positive since 2004.

Revenues grew from $64m in 2011 to $164m in 2012 to $1.9 bn in 2013.

Adjusted EBITDA rose from $4m (2011) to $28m (2012) to $825m (2013)

GAAP profit jumped from a loss of $0.7m in 2011 to $11.1m in 2012 to $714.3m in 2013.

One game (Candy Crush Saga) makes up 78% of its gross bookings while three games (Candy Crush Saga, Pet Rescue Saga and Farm Heroes Saga) account for 95% of revenue.

Marketing expenses rose from $55 million in 2012 to $377 million in 2013, representing 20% of revenue.

The company has $408m in cash and cash equivalents, and recently paid out $504 million in dividends.

“Durable” items, which can be used over extended periods of gameplay made up 4% (2011), 13% (2012) and 1% (2013) of King’s revenue, and the company expects this to decline in the future.

The value of a durable is spread over the lifetime of a gamer in a game (what we call duration) which King estimates as between five and eight months for the top three games.

Advertising has fallen from 12% of revenue in 2010 to 1% in 2013. King discontinued the sale of advertising in the second quarter of 2013.

North America represents 55% of King’s activity, the UK is 11% and no other country was more than 10%.（source：gamesbrief）

5）As chat apps become viable for games, Facebook spends big on WhatsApp

By Christian Nutt

Today, Facebook announced it has entered an agreement to acquire mobile messaging WhatsApp for $16 billion — $4 billion in cash, $12 billion in Facebook stock.

Additionally, the company will pay up to $3 billion in restricted stock units to retain the company’s staff over the next four years. Jan Koum, WhatsApp co-founder and CEO, will also join Facebook’s board. The deal is still subject to regulatory approval.

For now, Facebook’s Messenger app and WhatsApp will continue to operate as separate services, Facebook said. Over 450 million people use WhatsApp each month.

This deal is interesting to game developers because messaging apps are increasingly becoming major game distribution platforms globally: Japan’s LINE, China’s WeChat (from Tencent) and Korea’s KakaoTalk have all made major inroads into (and profits from) game distribution (see how WeChat is doing for an indication of the potential here).

However, Koum spoke out in January against the idea of adding games to WhatsApp. Despite that, now that he and his app are set to become part of Facebook — which places a big emphasis on games as a revenue-driver — he may feel the need to change his tune.（source：gamasutra）