风险投资公司Accel Partners的合伙人Rich Wong，一直很关注移动行业的投资动向。他曾见证了谷歌以7.5亿美元收购Admob的过程，同时也是Getjar、Mopub和3LM（游戏邦注：该项目在推出前就被摩托罗拉收购）等公司的投资者。

他最近的投资对象是《愤怒的小鸟》开发商Rovio。游戏邦获悉，《愤怒的小鸟》日前下载量已超过1亿次，Rovio在A轮融资中获得了4200万美元资金。

Rich Wong

像红杉资本和Andreessen Horowitz之类的顶级风投公司在过去几个月也开始纷纷进入手机游戏行业，但你似乎早就看好Rovio，认为它有望成为游戏市场的新势力。

我不过是一个风险投资者。我认识Peter Vesterbacka有9年了。我曾告诉他，我们得在这一点上进行合作。我们等了10年，一直到市场形成了今天这个局面。

看到5岁的侄子、侄女们每天都在玩《愤怒的小鸟》，我发现自己真的很想成为这个公司的一员。但Peter说他们现在运作得很好，不需要什么风险投资。

故事还得回到去年夏天，那时候Peter刚刚加入Rovio团队的时候。每隔四五个月，Peter和我都会在不同的手机游戏大会碰面。去年夏天见到他的时候，我问他现在在做什么，他告诉正打造一个叫做《愤怒的小鸟》的项目。

我知道《愤怒的小鸟》当时已经是手机游戏冠军，但我还是忍不住怀疑，它会一直高居榜首吗？当时我并没有想到它会有今天的成就。这款游戏那时还处于初级发展阶段，我和Peter经常保持联系，到了仲夏的时候，我终于开始想，这款游戏真的形成了气候，它一直在排行榜上位居前列。

我开始不断打电话给Rovio团队，问他们想不想合作，最后终于花了9个月时间说服了他们。这真是太棒了。虽然花了这么长的时间，但还是很值得。

你们和其他公司商谈过投资事宜吗？

曾经和一些公司谈过，但从没有哪一家公司具备Rovio这种条件。我明显对《愤怒的小鸟》情有独钟。但你仔细想想，所有玩家每天花在这款游戏的时间长达2亿分钟，它的月活跃用户高达4000万人，这是前所未有的事情。从来没有一款游戏可以这样大小通吃，让我五岁的亲戚和40多岁的哥哥深深陷入其中。

我们还有很长一段路要走，尽管可能还要克服很多的困难，但Rovio确实是一个很特别的公司。

你是因为把宝押在《愤怒的小鸟》身上，所以才向Rovio投资吗？还是说你坚信Rovio可以推出其他成功的原创新作？你认为Rovio推出的游戏不但将成为下一个《超级马里奥》，甚至还会是下一个《塞尔达传说》？

《愤怒的小鸟》已经推出许多不同版本，如《愤怒的小鸟节日版》、《Angry Birds Rio》以及其他衍生产品。他们当然还可以融入其他物理玩法，但目前的游戏内容和角色仍然还有很多发挥空间。他们最终探索出了一条非同寻常的游戏发展之路。

这是第一点，下面来说说第二点——来记得JAMDAT吗？JAMDAT当时的身价达6.8亿美元，该公司主要为摩托罗拉Razr平台开发游戏，JAMDAT算得上是当时业内领先的手机游戏开发商，而那时的市场规模远不如今天，所以我觉得Rovio是一家潜力无限的公司。

但说实话，Rovio还有很多发展突破口，他们可以推出新的原创游戏，或者开发以小猪为主角的新游戏，也可能推出Facebook版本游戏。《Angry Birds Rio》就要问世了，我们得把握其他的市场动态，比如了解威瑞森运营的iPhone手机、Android的快速发展以及iPad 2问世等推动手机游戏向前发展的重要情况。

或者你这样来看，《愤怒的小鸟》单广告资源就达到两年半前AdMob的总体水平。詹森·斯佩罗（Jason Spero）和奥马尔·哈默伊（Omar Hamoui）（游戏邦注：前者为谷歌移动业务高管，后者是AdMob创始人）两人拉动的业务量就这么多，而《愤怒的小鸟》仅凭自己的力量就可以达到这种水平。

你建议Rovio出售部分内容，然后通过网站分享一些免费内容？

没有。《纽约时报》有自己的一些付费内容，但也通过网站分享一些免费内容。Rovio可以出售X%的内容，然后将Y%的内容通过Admob的服务与用户分享。例如，Rovio与微软Bing的广告合作就属于这种情况。

通过不同的方式来拓展游戏项目，例如以小猪的视角开发新游戏，Rovio就无需扩大项目运营范围就能获得不错的收益。

最令人欣慰的是，《愤怒的小鸟》虽然是一夜成名，但Roivo历时8年才走到今天这一步。这并非Rovio开发的第一款游戏，而是第52款。Rovio团队之前还为诺基亚和其他移动设备开发过多年的游戏，我认为他们已经从自己经历过的错误和挫折中总结出失败经验，成长为一个成熟的团队。

作为一个风险投资者，有一点很重要：你是否相信这个团队。我认为Rovio的开发团队不仅具备理论上的知识，他们同时还能够证明自己的实力，他们已经历过许多艰难时期。这就是为什么找到了一个值得信任的团队会这么让人高兴了。我很相信Rovio团队的成员。

你认为风投资金将如何改变小型独立手机游戏开发商的面貌？这一行会不会出现和Facebook平台一样的状况：因为用户获取成本上升，这个市场的资源就会集中到Zynga、EA Playfish等少数大型开发商的手上？

这是发展的第二阶段，手机游戏行业才刚刚起步。iPhone推出还不到3年半，Android问世也还不到2年，而iPad才发布了1年零2个月。

我们才刚开始，这一行还有大量的创新空间。如果要问我是否相信或者希望Rovio成为这些巨头公司之一的话，我只能说Rovio有向这个方向发展的潜力，我并不是偏袒Roivo，而是确实认为他们现在很占优势。

自从有了虚拟货币后，游戏运营模式逐步转向了免费模式，但Rovio似乎还在采用付费下载模式？Rovio是否需要顺应市场变化做出相应的调整？

Rovio已经有Mighty Eagle这项虚拟商品。所有人都可以在提供虚拟商品的前提下，体验免费游戏，这是一个新硅谷模式。Rovio来自于芬兰埃斯波，他们不喜欢墨守陈规，所以他们的运营也不会落入俗套。

Rovio过去曾公开批评了Android在计费系统上的缺陷。你觉得今年谷歌会进一步改善这个问题吗？

谷歌没有别的选择，只能改善它的计费系统，但未来6个月，它的这一服务是不是比得上iTunes呢？这我就不得而知了，但相信一定会有所改进。

你认为Facebook在手机计费服务中将扮演什么角色？当然他们都希望通过手机版Facebook平台从开发商身上抽取一些营收。但苹果对此加大控制，这两者的竞争局面似乎有点紧张。

我对应用商店研究很多，但对计费服务了解的却很少。作为Facebook的投资者，我不便表明立场。但从Rovio投资者的角度来说，这些平台之间的竞争更有利于开发商的发展。

我发现，手机游戏开发商大多专注于Android或者iOS平台，但多数人认为两个平台各有千秋，难以取舍。是否认为如今的手机游戏市场，是苹果和谷歌两分天下的格局？

如果没和诺基亚联手，这对微软来说将会是一场硬仗。诺基亚的手机出货量仍然非常之高，现在就看开发商们转移到这些平台的速度了。诺基亚今年会推出一些新款手机，但在2012年才会大量推出WP7智能手机。这速度相对来说还是偏慢，新一代的Android平板电脑到时候也已经问世了。所以这个市场也许到时会演变成“三足鼎立”，但如果微软稍有怠慢，它就可能会被甩在后面。

我知道这不是一个很有见解的答案，但相信微软有实力，只是得付出一定代价。

最后，你对Rovio还有没有什么看法？

Rovio出售了200多万件毛绒玩具。作为一个风险投资者，我从没想过我居然也会用到毛绒玩具这个词语。

不论是消费品牌或者娱乐项目，都很少有人能取得这样的成就。极少有玩具品牌能够像史努比一样：4岁小孩玩完后，把玩具保存起来，留给以后的子女玩。也许这样像是在替Rovio说话，但我认为Rovio确实有获得堪比史努比品牌知名度的发展潜力。

通过虚拟商品交易、Admob广告赞助、一次性付费下载和订阅等渠道创收是传统的游戏运营法则。但如果推出毛绒玩具呢？我知道这听起来可能有点疯狂或者奇怪。但一只毛绒猪也许就能卖到30美元。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，转载请注明来源：游戏邦）

Q&A: Accel’s Rich Wong on the Firm’s Big Bet With Angry Birds

Rich Wong of Accel Partners is more or less a fixture in mobile venture investing. While seeing Admob through to its $750 million sale to Google, he’s also made a number of notable investments in companies like Getjar, Mopub and 3LM, which was acquired before launch by Motorola.

His latest investment was with Angry Birds-maker Rovio, which attracted a $42 million Series A investment, after its title became the little-physics-game-that-could with nearly 100 million downloads.

A number of top-tier VCs like Sequoia and Andreessen Horowitz have gone in on mobile gaming in the last few months. But it seems like you really held out for the crown jewels with Rovio.

Well, I’m just a VC. I’ve known Peter Vesterbacka for nine years. And I told him, I have to work with you on this one. We’ve been waiting essentially a decade for the market to look like this. Is this a mass market idea? Can it scale?

When I saw all of my five-year-old nieces and nephews playing this game every day, I just knew that I really, really wanted to be part of this company. But Peter would say that they were just doing fine and that they didn’t need venture capital.

The story goes back to last summer when he first started at Rovio. Every four to five months, Peter and I would get together at different mobile conferences.When I saw him last summer, I asked him what he was up to. What’s going on? What’s hot? And he said he was going to do this thing called Angry Birds.

I knew it was at the top of the rankings, but I wondered, could it stay up there? It wasn’t obvious to me that it was going to be what it is today. It was still the very early days. So we stayed in touch, and then by mid-summer or so, I began to think — wow, it’s really taking off. They’re really continuing to stay at the top of the leaderboards.

I started to call them often and ask: Do you want to work together? Ultimately, it took nine months from summer until March to convince them. It’s great. If it takes that long, it’s still worth it.

Were you talking to anyone else?

I did talk to a few others. But there really aren’t others like this one. Obviously, I’m biased. But if you think about it – 200 million minutes of usage a day. 40 million monthly actives. This just doesn’t happen. It just doesn’t happen that a game that my 5-year-old loves is the same game my 40-year-old brother loves.

We’ve got a long ways to go. There are a lot of things that could not go right, but it’s a special company.

Is the valuation you went in on essentially a bet on Angry Birds alone? Or is it on the assumption that Rovio can successfully launch new IP? Basically, are you betting that they can not only create a Mario Bros.-style franchise, but a Zelda one too?

Angry Birds already has multiple flavors. There’s Seasons, Rio and other derivatives. Obviously, there is other physics-related gameplay they could do. But there is so much they can do with the content and characters they already have. They’ve found a way to keep it going in a way that very few other people have.

That’s thing one. Thing two is — remember JAMDAT? If that company was worth $680 million and they were making games on the Motorola Razr, which was state of the art at that time, and the market was an order of magnitude smaller than it is today, I think Rovio could be a very valuable company. Even with that valuation, you wouldn’t have to count on anything that’s not completely in line of sight to get a financial return.

But honestly, this thing can go in a whole bunch of different ways. It can go toward new IP. Or maybe they can create games from the pig’s point of view, like Peter has said in the past.

There’s all these other extensions like the Facebook launch. Rio is about to launch. Then you’ve got all of these other market dynamics like the Verizon iPhone, the acceleration of Android, the iPad 2. This is all going to accelerate the market dramatically.

Or if you think about this way — Angry Birds’ ad inventory alone is similar to Admob’s total inventory a little over 2 1/2 years ago. Think about all the deals that Jason Spero and Omar Hamoui had to strike to get there. Angry Birds is already that size.

You’re suggesting that Rovio sell its own inventory and cut out the networks?

Well, no. The New York Times has its own inventory they sell themselves but they also have remnant invetory that they put out to the networks. Rovio can sell X% itself and put Y% through Admob. You’re already seeing the beginnings of that with the Bing and Angry Birds deal, for example.

If you add that, plus different ways of extending the franchise — maybe with titles from the pigs’ perspective — you can see yourself through with a very nice outcome without assuming anything bigger.

The best part about this, is that this is an overnight success that took eight years to happen. This isn’t their first game. This is their 52nd game. These guys worked their asses off for years developing titles for Nokia and other devices. My point is that they had the discipline to go through all the things that were not successful — all those mistakes, all those landmines, all that institutional knowledge.

It’s a bit of truism that after you look at all the revenue and EBITDA multiples and the left-brain quantitative aspects of being a VC, it really comes down to: do you believe in the team or not?

These guys do not just have in theory an ability to fight through. They’ve proven themselves. They’ve fought through many tough times before. That’s why it’s a joy when you find a team you really believe in. I really believe in these guys.

How do you think venture capital money is going to change the landscape for smaller, indie mobile gaming developers? Are we going to see what happened on the Facebook platform where costs of user acquisition rise to the point where you end up with a handful of dominant companies like Zynga and EA Playfish?

It’s only the second inning. We just started. The iPhone is less than 3.5 years years old. Android is less than 2 years old. The iPad is 1.2 years old.

We’re just starting. There’s a ton of room for continued innovation. Do I believe and do I hope that Rovio is one of those dominant companies? I think they have earned the right to have a shot at it. I don’t want to be an oligopolist for saying it, but they have a very interesting position in the ecosystem.

While the industry has been moving to a free-to-play model with virtual currencies, Rovio has seemed to mostly stand by the premium, paid app model? Should they make the transition too?

They do have that Mighty Eagle virtual good purchase [which helps users pass a difficult level]. Everybody is going free-to-play with virtual goods. That’s the new Silicon Valley model.

These guys are from Espoo, Finland. They don’t feel like they need to play conventionally. They’re fine with being off the beaten track.

Rovio has publicly criticized Android’s payments infrastructure in the past. Can Google get it right this year?

It has nowhere to go but towards improvement. Will it rival iTunes’ fitness in the next six months? I don’t know, but it will get better.

What’s Facebook’s role in mobile payments? Surely, they’ll want to have access to downstream revenues from their platform on mobile. But Apple is exerting more control. It seems like there is a natural tension there.

I’ve thought a lot about app stores, but not as much about payments. If I had my Facebook-Accel hat on, I couldn’t tell you. But from the more simplistic point of view of being an investor in Rovio, the good news is that all of these platform battles will make life better for them.

When I talk to mobile developers, they seem to be mostly thinking about Android or iOS. But when I talk to people who have been working in the mobile industry for a long time, they really hesitate to count any other platform out. Is it officially a two horse-race now?

Without the Nokia deal, it felt pretty uphill for Microsoft. One billion dollars buys you a lot of distribution. Nokia still ships a boatload of volume. Now it’s about how quickly they can move to those platforms. There will be some devices this year but the volume devices will come in 2012. That feels a little slow. The next-generation Android tablets will be out by then.

Maybe it is a three-horse race. But if they miss another step, they may not be able to catch up.

That’s not a super insightful answer. I think they have a shot, but they had to pay for it.

Any last, less obvious thoughts on Rovio?

Rovio sold over 2 million plush toys. As a VC, I never thought I’d say the word plush toys in any context.

Whether it’s consumer brands or entertainment franchises, there are very few things that earn the right to get there. There are very few brands that get to be the Snoopy stuffed animal you get when you’re four years old that you keep until you’re much older so you can give it to your children.

Maybe this is a very biased Rovio point, but they are a brand with the potential to achieve that.

Free-to-play with virtual goods, Admob advertising, the one-time download, the subscription and so on — that’s the conventional gaming wisdom. But what if it’s all about plush toys? I know that it sounds crazy or odd. But maybe it’s $30 pigs.（Source：Inside Mobile Apps）