Happy Lunar New Year!

新年快乐- xīnnián kuàilè! Happy Lunar New Year to all of our readers! May the Year of the Fire Monkey be prosperous for you all.

Xiaomi Game Center’s 2015 Annual Report

Xiaomi released the Xiaomi Game Center’s 2015 annual report. The report shows that the Xiaomi Game Center had 1.45 billion downloads in terms of games distributed, compared with 780 million in 2014, generating revenue of RMB 2.6 billion (their channel fee + publishing fee) for the full year of 2015. The revenue split for developers in 2015 totaled RMB 1.1 billion. The number of paying users on their mobile platform increased by 55.68% QoQ, and ARPU increased by 33.1% QoQ. Top game genres on the platform include “casual & creative” (29%), “parkour & running” (12%) and “online RPG” (10%)

WeChat Lucky Money

On February 5th as a lead-up to the New Year, the Communist Party of China’s Organization Department has created a Wechat account to distribute 300,000-yuan worthof lucky money. In a clever twist, the passwords were all phrases from President Xi Jinping’s New Year greetings – for example, “as long as we persevere, dreams will come true.”

Niko Partners in the News

Niko Partners was interviewed and our research has been discussed in the media several times in the past week. Here is a sample:

  • Chinese mobile game revenues could double to $11.1B by 2019 – VentureBeat
  • Chinese mobile market has hit peak growth – GamesIndustry.biz
  • The Top 14 Predictions for China’s Games Industry in 2016 – Gamasutra
  • How China Will Boost ESports and Virtual Reality Revenues – Fortune

    • Malaysia’s iCandy Has Successful IPO

    We noted last week the impending IPO of Malaysia’s iCandy. As it happened, the company’s shares surged 25% on debut.

    Shanda Group to Start VR Theme Park

    Shanda Group is planning to create China’s first virtual reality park in China with the help of The Void, a US-based entertainment company that specializes in VR.

    Niko Partners on Twitter

    Follow us on Twitter @nikochina to see these comments in real time as we publish them! Here are a few of our tweets from last week:

  • Our Lunar New Year gift to you is a free data-rich report on the Chinese mobile games market, written by DataEye. https://nikopartners.com/2146-2/
  • China is poised to lead growth of mobile games and virtual reality content. via @FortuneMagazinehttp://for.tn/1PusMju
  • Happy Year of the Fire Monkey!
  • Niko Partners: Chinese mobile market has hit peak growth | http://GamesIndustry.biz http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2016-02-08-niko-partners-chinese-mobile-market-has-hit-peak-growth …
  • Niko predictions: Chinese mobile game revs could double to $11.1B by 2019 | GamesBeat | Games | by Dean Takahashi http://venturebeat.com/2016/02/03/chinese-mobile-game-revenues-could-double-to-11-1b-by-2019/ …
  • China’s Mobile Users & Gamers https://nikopartners.com/chinas-mobile-users-gamers/ …
  • 16 DOTA Teams Ready For The Shanghai Major In March http://insidegamesasia.biz/16-teams-ready-for-the-shanghai-major-in-march/ …