Hike logs out of gaming platform WinZO in $12 mn deal

The move by WinZO follows the company's series B funding round in September 2020, through which it raised close to $18 million.Premium
The move by WinZO follows the company's series B funding round in September 2020, through which it raised close to $18 million.
 2 min read . Updated: 03 May 2021, 10:54 PM IST Tarush Bhalla

BENGALURU : Social gaming platform WinZO on Monday said that it has provided a complete exit to early investor Hike Pvt. Ltd through a share buyback worth $12 million.

Hike has received a four-fold return on its investment in the gaming company through the buyback, WinZO said.

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Hike and Kalaari Capital had led WinZO’s $5 million Series A round in July 2019.

The news of Hike’s exit comes after WinZO had raised close to $18 million in Series B funding, led by existing investors, including co-chair of Bain Capital and early investor in Epic Games Stephan Pagliuca, Singapore-based Makers Fund and New York-based Courtside Venture in September 2020, taking the total fundraise tally for the three-year-old startup to $38 million.

Earlier this year, Hike had announced the shutting down of its primary messaging business and launched an online gaming platform Rush, which is similar to WinZO.

Post its Series B round, WinZO had reportedly waived off the non-compete for Hike and withdrawn access to the board and the company.

“As founders, we are humbled to have a board that is extremely bullish and completely aligned with the audacious goals we have set for ourselves. They had immensely supported the company through the process," said Paavan Nanda, co-founder of WinZO.

WinZO offers more than 80 games in more than 12 regional languages. The games include Candy Crush, Metro Surfer, Carrom, Chess, Ludo and Pool.

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Since inception, the company claims to have a registered a user base of more than 40 million with a strong foothold in tier-2 cities as well as rural India.

In November, WinZO had announced the launch of its second game developer fund with a corpus of $5 million to groom aspiring game creators through training programmes.

It is also focusing on game ops, streaming and e-sports through its second fund.

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