Riccardo Zacconi is the co-founder of King, the company behind “Candy Crush Saga” that was sold for $5.9 billion in 2016. He gives tienkiem.com.vn the inside story of the game that has hit the sweet spot for millions around the world.
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iccardo Zacconi’s business nearly went bankrupt in 2003. The dot-com bubble had burst, Zacconi had put all of his money into start-up gaming company Midasplayer, and he and his co-founders had spent the year trying and failing to find investment. It was just before Christmas and they needed to find the money before the holidays, or they would have to shut the company down.
Zacconi had put around half a million dollars into the business, made from the sale of dating website uDate to Match.com and he had attempted to reduce all personal costs to zero by selling his possessions and staying with a friend.
He and his co-founders had put their money into Midasplayer at the start of 2003. “Then I put the rest of my money in August of 2003. And we were basically both feet in the venture, in the boat. So, we had to navigate. There was no option out,” Zacconi told tienkiem.com.vn’s “The Brave Ones.”
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Then one investor gave Midasplayer a lifeline: Zacconi’s former boss Mel Morris, the founder of uDate. But for Morris to make the cash available, his trustees had to give permission and there was no sign of the paperwork coming through.
It got to Christmas Eve and Zacconi thought he would have to abandon the business.
“I had a flight booked in the evening to fly back to Italy. And the signed papers with the financing had still not arrived. So, we would’ve had to sign to shut down the company that day,” Zacconi said.
“And I will never forget. I was physically on the floor, sitting on the floor with my co-founder. We were really destroyed. And suddenly, we heard that a fax was coming through. And in the middle of the fax, the fax machine broke down. So we bought a new fax machine. The contract was signed. And so, we could continue,” he added.
The business was saved, and eventually went on to become one of the world’s most successful gaming companies, with “Candy Crush Saga” making $258 million in the third quarter of 2019 alone according to data from consultancy Sensor Tower. But its near-bankruptcy was the first of many struggles the company would have to go through before making “Candy Crush Saga” work on a massive scale.
“Candy Crush Saga” was launched by King in November 2012, and by November 2017 it, plus “Candy Crush Soda Saga” and “Candy Crush Jelly Saga” had been downloaded 2.73 billion times.
King had revenues of $2.1 billion in the fiscal year which ended September 2015, and in November that same year Activision Blizzard announced it would acquire King for $5.9 billion, in an effort to reach mobile gamers. Co-founder Zacconi owned 9.9% of King, meaning his stake was worth about $584 million.
That $5.9 billion price tag is higher than the sums paid for Marvel and Lucasfilm, which Disney bought for around $4 billion each.
King’s games, which also include “Bubble Witch Saga,” “Farm Heroes Saga” and “Pet Rescue Saga,” had 247 million monthly active users (MAU) as of the third quarter 2019, down from 262 million a year prior according to Activision Blizzard’s latest results statement.