Everything you need to know this week about the games market in Asia
Every week, our analysts review dozens of news sources, from multiple countries, in multiple languages. From this, we give you the stories that are most important, and the analysis to tell you why.
Happy New Year!
Happy Year of the Goat! - 羊年快乐！
We're looking forward to an exciting 2015 and our 13th year of providing high integrity market intelligence reports and services on the Chinese and Southeast Asian digital games markets to clients around the world.
Supercell, global powerhouse mobile game developer of Clash of Clans and Boom Beach, announced that it will deliver WeChat Hong Bao (red envelopes) in the game Boom Beach, becoming the first mobile game ever to send WeChat Hong Bao. The Hong Bao values will be 1 RMB, 8 RMB, 88 RMB and 188 RMB. There is a tradition in China to give a (physical) red envelope of money to children and others during the Chinese New Year holidays - and this is a digital representation of that within a mobile game.
Our friends at Tech in Asia have posted a cool "heat map" of the movement of humans in China as the Chinese New Year holiday begins today. Check out the cool graphic.
IDC says that Xiaomi has beaten Samsung's market share in China, 12.5% vs 12.1% for all of 2014. Niko anticipates domestic mobile phone brands to dominate foreign brands in 2015. Also, Xiaomi has global aspirations and will launch mi.com in the US soon - its move to start sales in the US market.
Zynga announced that it has officially closed its China office (which was in Beijing), and will lay off more than 100 Chinese employees. Zynga closed its office in Japan in 2013 and closed multiple US offices in 2014.
Singapore is keeping pace with its technology prowess, and it seems that all three national telcos have achieved 4G coverage ahead of planned schedule. Singtel now covers most of Singapore with 4G, followed by M1 and StarHub. This is reported by Singapore's Infocomm Development Authority (IDA).
Niko News is just one part of the strategy and expertise offered by Niko Partners to help our clients better understand and successfully navigate the thriving games markets of China and Southeast Asia.
Niko Partners is the leading provider of market intelligence, custom research, and consulting services focused on the games industries in China and Southeast Asia. Since 2003 we have provided critical information to the world's leading game publishers, developers, hardware makers, and game service providers as well as to government policymakers, trade associations, and institutional investors.
