SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Skillz (NYSE: SKLZ), the leading mobile games platform bringing fair and fun competition to players worldwide, today announced it has formed a strategic partnership with Exit Games, global developer of Photon, the world’s most advanced synchronous multiplayer gaming technology.
Headquartered in Hamburg, Germany, Exit Games allows developers to create and host real-time, synchronous multiplayer games. Its nearly 600,000 trusted partners include some of the most well-respected game publishers and developers in the world, such as EA, Square Enix, and Ubisoft, among others, powering gameplay in over 700,000 applications.
Skillz’s investment in Exit Games will give the Company permanent access to Exit’s technology to power its esports tournaments and platform exclusively. The partnership will dramatically accelerate Skillz’s timeline to support multiplayer synchronous content on the platform, while also enabling Skillz to build unrivaled features in tandem with Exit’s gaming technology. Publishers and developers worldwide will now have the ability to build games on the Skillz platform in entirely new genres, such as battle royale, while continuing to provide gamers with the confidence that their contests will always live up to the Skillz promise of fairness.
“Bringing the world’s best synchronous, multiplayer gaming technology to Skillz unlocks tremendous opportunity, greatly accelerating our entry into popular genres like fighting, first-person shooter, and racing,” said Andrew Paradise, CEO and Founder of Skillz. “Expanding into these new areas will grow our total universe of players and allow us to capture an even greater share of their leisure time and spend, while also introducing the technology and infrastructure necessary to attract more of the hottest, most creative developers, publishers, brands, and iconic franchises to our platform.”
Under the terms of the deal, Skillz has invested $50 million for a minority stake in Exit Games. In addition, Paradise will join the Board of Exit Games as a board observer.
“We are big admirers of Skillz and how they are innovating in the field of competitive gaming,” said Christof Wegmann, the Founder and CTO of Exit Games. “This investment is a natural fit. We’re pleased to have Skillz as a long-term partner in bringing synchronous play to our developers and their gaming fans around the world.”
LionTree Advisors served as financial advisor and Orrick served as legal advisor to Skillz in the transaction. GP Bullhound served as financial advisor and Taylor Wessing served as legal advisor to Exit Games.
About Skillz Inc.
Skillz is the leading mobile games platform that connects players in fair, fun, and meaningful competition. The Skillz platform helps developers build multi-million dollar franchises by enabling social competition in their games. Leveraging its patented technology, Skillz hosts billions of casual esports tournaments for millions of mobile players worldwide, and distributes millions in prizes each month. Skillz has earned recognition as one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies, CNBC’s Disruptor 50, Forbes’ Next Billion-Dollar Startups, and the #1 fastest-growing company in America on the Inc. 5000. www.skillz.com
About Exit Games
Founded in 2004, Exit Games is the provider of Photon, the world’s leading realtime multiplayer technology and cloud service for mobile, PC, Mac, Web, Console, VR, AR & MR. Developers are using Photon to create games and applications that offer true synchronous realtime experiences that scale to millions of users. Photon powers thousands of games and applications enjoyed by over 500 million users a month. About 600,000 developers including some of the world’s leading companies trust in Photon to fuel their realtime experiences, such as Disney, Square Enix, Ubisoft, Garmin, Oculus, Atari, RecRoom, BandaiNamco or Volkswagen. www.photonengine.com
