Per reporter: Li Jianning Per editor: Dong Xingsheng
Recently, the "2021 China Game Market Investment and Financing Survey Report" released by Gamma Data shows that since 2020, the investment activity of China's game market has been significantly strengthened. In 2021, the number of investment events exceeded the sum of the previous two years, reaching 209, with a total investment amount of about 25.88 billion yuan.
The "Daily Economic News" reporter noted that with the gradual improvement of user consumption level and the quality requirements for game products, the game market has gradually entered the era of "content is king". In this case, game developers have been favored by more funds, and they also pay more attention to the investor's own research and development experience and the technical support they can give.
Image source: Screenshot of the report
Gao Dongxu, founder and chief analyst of China Entertainment Think Tank, said that in the current market, many small and medium-sized game companies, especially R& D enterprises, are facing many difficulties, the first of which is survival. "This objectively provides an opportunity for investment and acquisition of large companies. In addition, the demand for R& D strength of major game companies is also increasing, which has contributed to the formation of this wave of investment. ”
In 2021, the total amount of game investment from 209 is about 25.88 billion
According to the statistics of gamma data, the investment events in the domestic game industry have decreased from 106 in 2016 to 57 in 2019 year by year, and the activity of game investment has been significantly strengthened after 2020, with 117 and 209 in 2020 and 2021 respectively, and the number of investment events has nearly doubled.
Behind the "hot" number of game investments is a more "calm" capital. The report shows that among investors, the number of game companies has risen from less than 60% in 2016 to about 80% in recent years. This means that with the departure of private floating capital, more professional enterprises have gradually become the main force of investment, and the game industry has entered a new stage of scale, standardization and high-quality development.
In addition, from December 2020 to August 2021, the total market value of the top 10 game companies with domestic market capitalization fell by more than 700 billion yuan, and the secondary market investment in games was also more cautious.
Every reporter also found that from 2020 to 2021, although the number of game investments increased by 92, there was not much difference in the amount of investment. The report shows that the total amount of investment in the game market in 2021 is 25.88 billion yuan, and according to the data in the report, the disclosed amount of investment in the game market in 2020 is about 21.71 billion yuan, and the difference between the two is only about 4 billion yuan.
Gao Dongxu believes that at present, many small and medium-sized game companies, especially R & D-based enterprises, are facing difficulties in survival, so there will be a certain discount on the financing price, and there is a good opportunity to "bottom out". "At the same time, the demand for R&D strength in large companies is also increasing, and under the influence of these two factors, a large but small amount of investment has slowly formed."
In terms of specific investment, in the past two years, more than 80% of the investment events have obtained less than 30% of the equity, and only 9.8% of the investment has obtained an absolute controlling right of more than 50%; in terms of investment methods, 66.5% of the investors choose to participate in the financing of game enterprises through strategic investment. The report points out that investors in the game market pay more attention to strategic synergies, emphasize cooperation with financing companies, strengthen the layout of the game field and enrich their product matrix, rather than interfering with the operation of financier enterprises.
Judging from the establishment time of financing enterprises, game companies that have been established for 4 to 7 years have received significant attention in the past six years. When invested, the proportion of enterprises that were established less than three years ago fell sharply from nearly 90% in 2016 to about 50%, and investors have always paid higher attention to start-ups.
Old Player Expansion Track New players accelerate into the game
The head effect is also evident in the game market investment. The data shows that the investment events in which the TOP10 enterprises participate in the number of investments account for nearly 80% of the total investment. Among them, whether in terms of the number of investments or the amount of investment, Tencent is far higher than other enterprises.
From 2020 to 2021, Tencent's investment in the game market reached 129, accounting for 39.57%, far exceeding the 30 cases of the second place Bilibili; Tencent has disclosed an investment amount of 41.46 billion yuan, accounting for nearly 90% of the total investment amount in the game market, becoming an important promoter of investment in the game market.
In addition to traditional game industry giants such as Tencent, there are also new players like ByteDance among the top 10 companies in the number of investments.
Relying on the advantages of short videos and online information platforms, ByteDance takes casual games as the starting point and builds a game brand "Dawn and Sunset Lightyear" from 2019. As of the first half of 2021, there have been 18 investments in the game market, most of which are strategic investments or mergers and acquisitions, and the investment objects include a number of game companies with mature product research and development systems, such as AiHui Entertainment and Mu Hitomi Technology.
In Gao Dongxu's view, the frequent acquisitions after ByteDance entered the game field are similar to Tencent's early strategy, which is intended to expand the game team, enrich the content pool, enhance the competitiveness of research and development, and lay out the entire industrial chain through investment and mergers.
It can be seen that investing in other game companies is a choice for old players to strengthen cooperation between the two sides and broaden the field of segmentation, and it is also a shortcut for new players to quickly enter the game track and build a moat.
According to the Gamma Data Survey, 83.3% of the financing of small and medium-sized game enterprises is used for business expansion, 43.3% is used for strategic adjustment, and 30.0% is used for their own capital turnover. Among the enterprises with financing needs, nearly 60% of the required financing amount is less than 4 million.
"Small and medium-sized enterprises receive investment from large factories, the first thing is to maintain the survival of enterprises, but also to provide more funds and related resources for product research and development and issuance." Gao Dongxu said.
R & D manufacturers are still favored The two-dimensional and meta-universe has become an investment trend
With the rising cost of buying, the growth of user consumption level and the improvement of requirements for game product quality, the game market has entered the era of "content is king". At the same time, the number of game versions has shown a downward trend year by year since 2017, and the increasingly rare version number resources not only force enterprises to improve their innovation capabilities, but also expand the financing needs of enterprises.
According to the report, since 2016, at least 60% of the investment has been on game development every year, and the proportion is more than 80% in 2021. For investors, investment game R&D enterprises can quickly bind high-quality R&D teams and strengthen high-quality product reserves.
In fact, not only do investors value the R&D capabilities of enterprises, but also pay more attention to the investor's own R&D experience and technical support under the premise of ensuring their independent operation. The report points out that in addition to providing financial support, investors can also provide other resources such as customer diversion, technical support, and development experience for the R&D team to promote the output of high-quality game products.
The diversified user demand and mature game type market tend to be saturated, and the segment represented by the "second dimension" has gradually become the "new favorite" of the game market. "2021 China Game Industry Report" shows that in 2021, China's secondary mobile game market revenue of 28.425 billion yuan, an increase of 27.43% year-on-year, the rise of "Generation Z" prompted enterprises to increase the development and promotion of secondary themes, but also attracted more funds to invest. Taking Tencent as an example, in the two years from 2020 to 2021, Tencent invested in more than 20 enterprises with secondary product research and development business.
"In addition to the quadratic type, metaverse games are bound to be a trend for next investment." According to statistics, in 2021, the investment events around VR/AR technology companies in the game market accounted for 4.31%, although the proportion is not high, but there has been a clear upward trend.
Gao Dongxu told reporters that in 2021, Tencent, ByteDance, Alibaba and other domestic manufacturers have laid out the VR track, and Epic Games, a well-known foreign game company, has also obtained $1 billion in financing for the development of meta-universe business. It can be expected that in 2022, a large part of the capital will be tilted to the metaverse and VR and other related fields.
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