Nazara Technologies to invest upto Rs 30 crore in subsidiary Next Wave Multimedia

Diversified gaming and sports media platform Nazara Technologies announced on March 4 that it will make an investment of up to Rs 30 crore in subsidiary Next Wave Multimedia, following an in-principle approval from the company's board of directors.

Next Wave Multimedia is a mobile game developer that focuses on casual and multiplayer mobile games in the sports genre. Nazara Technologies had acquired the Chennai-based firm in 2018 and currently owns about 52.38 percent stake in the firm.

The company's flagship title is World Cricket Championship (WCC), which claims to be the largest mobile-based cricket simulation game. It has subsequently released two sequels so far - WCC2 and WCC3.

The game is played by around 10.7 million monthly active users for about 45 minutes per day, Nazara Technologies said in its earnings release in February 2022.

Among other game titles offered by the company include Real Carrom, World Table Tennis Champs and Bowling Wizards. The company is also looking to launch its own non-fungible tokens (NFTs), Moneycontrol reported in November 2021.

Nazara's freemium games business, which includes only Next Wave Multimedia at present, had reported a profit of Rs 1.4 crore on revenue of Rs 5.7 crore in Q3-FY22, as compared to Rs 1.2 crore profit on revenue of Rs 6.2 crore in Q3-FY21.

That said, the company had previously said it was scouting for more acquisitions to expand its freemium business.

"In freemium, we only have Cricket and would like to have more competitive multiplayer games that lend themselves to esports. We would like to have more IPs in esports and more geographies under our belt" Nazara Technologies CEO Manish Agarwal had told Moneycontrol in an interview in October last year.

Apart from this investment, the company's board of directors have also approved issuance of 1.1 lakh shares (1,10,617 shares) worth Rs 25 crore (Rs 24,99,94,420) to existing Datawrkz shareholders Senthil Govindan, Arunprabu K, Mayank Khirwadkar, and Garale Vishal Tukaram as part of its deal to acquire majority stake in programmatic advertising and monetisation company Datawrkz.

On January 18, Nazara Technologies had announced plans to acquire a 55 percent stake in Datawrkz. The deal is being done through two tranches, with the company acquiring a 33 percent stake for Rs 60 crore in the first tranche. This includes Rs 35 crore in cash and Rs 25 crore in a share swap. It reserves an option to acquire an additional 22 percent in the second tranche that is expected to close in Q4 FY23.