History
Playphone was founded on February 6, 2003 by Ron Cznerny in Campbell, California, later moving to San Jose. [7] [8] The company initially sold pre-paid phone cards offering two mobile games, two polyphonic ringtones, and two wallpaper options. Early partners included Digital Bridges, offering access to game titles including Lara Croft Tomb Raider , and Disney's The Lion King . [9]
In September 2006, Playphone raised $9.1 million dollars in Series B funding from Menlo Ventures and Cardinal Venture Capital. [5] That same month, Playphone partnered with RealNetworks to launch a subscription-based service (adapted from its RealArcade service) providing more games, ringtones, and wallpapers for mobile phones. [10]
In May 2007, Playphone secured Series C funding of $18.75 million dollars from Scale Venture Capital, which was used to facilitate expansion into Latin America. [11] [12]
In May 2008, Playphone acquired Pitch Entertainment Group, a London-based mobile content distributor founded by David Warburton. [13] The acquisition of Pitch enabled Playphone to expand into 20 countries across Africa, Asia and Europe. [14] In June, Playphone partnered with Cellufun [15] to provide mobile content to its users. Later that year, the company partnered with UK-based Top Up TV to showcase its mobile content in a Playphone-branded TV channel [16] and signed new distribution agreements with Virgin Mobile USA [17] and Cincinnati Bell. [18]
In 2009, Playphone expanded a previous partnership with media optimization developer Vantrix. As part of the expansion, Playphone integrated the Vantrix Storefront Optimizer into their operations to sell content in the Asian mobile market. [19]
In October 2010, Playphone announced the launch of a new mobile social gaming platform for smartphones and tablets called Playphone Social. [20] The first game with support for the platform was launched in June 2011- an Android port of their popular iOS game, Playphone Poker. [21]
In August 2011, Playphone declared a partnership with Perfect World, a Chinese-based mobile gaming company, to distribute the developer's games on Playphone Social. [22] That December, Playphone commercially launched their new gaming network, [23] the Playphone Social Gaming Network. To compete with other publishers such as OpenFeint and Ngmoco, Playphone’s new platform featured cross-platform multiplayer in addition to its social elements. [24]
In March 2012 Playphone acquired SocialHour, a mobile social marketing firm, to strengthen their mobile marketing and distribution expertise in support of the growth and development of the Playphone Social Gaming Network. [25]
Playphone’s first carrier app store – Games Portal on Verizon – launched in 2013, coming preloaded on multiple Android devices. [26]
In 2015, Playphone launched its store on the now-defunct CyanogenMod mobile operating system. [27] Later that year, Japanese publisher GungHo Online Entertainment acquired 70% of Playphone’s shares, making it a subsidiary of the company. The acquisition was undertaken in order to expand the reach of both companies into mobile markets in southern Asia. [6] [28] By late 2018 GungHo had removed any mention of Playphone at its old url, playphone.com. [29]
