Jun 18 Game Development in Ukraine: Industry Guide
WHY GAMEDEV? Newzoo forecasts that in 2018 the games market revenue will reach $137.9 billion which is 13. more than in 2017.The revenue of the gaming industry today is bigger than the one of the movie industry and is closing to the revenue of the sports industry. Leading research companies estimate that the games market will continue to grow in the coming years both in regards to revenues and the number of players. All this makes the game development one of the most promising investment sectors in the world. A particularly rapid growth is observed in the mobile games market with a startling breakthrough happening during the last 10 years. In 2012, it accounted for the smallest market share, while in this year mobile games will generate more than a half of all revenues in the industry, namely $70.3 billion. Ukrainian game development industry is also evolving rapidly. Only in recent years more than 30 new game dev companies have appeared. Gamedev studios are present in almost all Ukraine's regions. At the same time, there has not been any research on the game development industry in Ukraine. ACHIEVERS HUB together with UNIT.City Innovation Park has made the first attempt to create the map of Ukrainian gamedev companies and analyze the market situation. We have conducted a large-scale survey among the local game development companies. The results of this survey laid the foundation for the following report. The report includes: How many companies are developing games in Ukraine and how many developers they employ? What is the year-by-year history of Ukrainian gamedev market? What is the geography of Ukrainian gamedev companies? What are the genres of the games developed in Ukraine, which platforms are they being developed for and which technologies are being used? What sources of funding do Ukrainian game studios use? Over 70 Ukrainian gamedev companies participated in the first survey. In the editions to follow, we plan to involve more participants.
GLOBAL GAMES MARKET: THE UNLEASHED GROWTH Source: Newzoo Global Games Market Forecast for 2018 Compound Annual Growth Rate Europe, Middle East and Africa $ 28.7 B $70.6 $76.5 $84.8 $93.1 $106.5 $121.7 $137.9 $151.9 $165.9 $180.1 Revenues, $ billion North America $ 32.7 B 18% 2 29% 34% 40% 46% 5 54% 57% 59% Latin America $ 5 B 37% 38% 36% Mobile games Asia-Pacific region $ 71.4 B 45% 39% 35% 34% 30% 27% 32% 30% 27% 24% 25% 22% 24% 2 2 19% 22% PC games Console games US China $ 30.4 B $ 37.9 B 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 Global market share 2 Europe, Middle East and Africa +8.8% annual growth rate Asia-Pacific region +16.8% annual growth rate 52% 2 North America +10% annual growth rate 4% Latin America +13.5% annual growth rate
TOP 25 PUBLIC COMPANIES BY GAME REVENUES IN 2017 Source: Newzoo Rank Company $ Amount, M Rank Company $ Amount, M Rank Company $ Amount, M 1 Tencent+S23 $ 18 120 10 Bandai Namco $ 2 428 19 Cyber Agent $ 1 232 2 Sony* $ 10 548 11 Netmarble $ 2 272 20 Konami $ 1 079 3 Apple* $ 8 037 12 Ubisoft $ 2 208 21 DeNA $ 890 4 Microsoft* $ 7 063 13 Nexon $ 2 085 22 Disney* $ 870 5 Activision Blizzard $ 6 513 14 Warner Bros* $ 1 936 23 Perfect World* $ 868 6 NetEase $ 5 576 15 TakeTwo $ 1 914 Interactive 24 Sega $ 860 7 Google* $ 5 346 16 Square Enix $ 1 743 25 *based on estimates 37 Interactive* $ 858 8 EA $ 5 095 17 Mixi $ 1 481 9 Nintendo* $ 3 625 18 NCSoft $ 1 458 The revenues of the companies that develop and sell video games can reach billions of dollars. There is one company that has its software development office in Ukraine among the top 25 businesses with the highest revenues in the gamedev sector, Ubisoft. In 2017, this French game developer has earned $2.2 billion.
THE TIMELINE OF UKRAINIAN GAMEDEV INDUSTRY: MORE THAN 10 YEARS OF DEVELOPMENT NikitoSNaz 4ININ 505 Ninja <1 year 1-2 years 3-5 years 6-10 years > 10 years
Number of Employees in Ukraine THE MAP OF UKRAINIAN GAMEDEV SECTOR: AN INDUSTRY THAT EMPLOYS THOUSANDS OF DEVELOPERS > 500 employees 100-500 employees * * 50-100 employees * ** ** 10-50 employees *** * < 10 employees * *** * 4ININ NikitoSNaz 505 Ninja * global offices employees more than 500 ** global offices employees more than 100 *** global offices employees more than 50
THE GAMEDEV INDUSTRY IN UKRAINE: PROFILE OF ACTIVITIES AND GEOGRAPHY OF HEADQUARTERS The profile of activities of Ukrainian gamedev companies * Gamdev companies which develop their own products 69% Countries where the HQs of the companies are located Outsourcing/outstuffing 37,5% Indie development 25% Ukraine 74% Provide services to gamedev companies 17% US 6% Consulting 17% Israel 5% Publishing 15% France Cyprus *The same company can be engaged in different types of activities Irland Check Republic Malta Russia China Lithuania Not indicated?
THE MAP OF UKRAINIAN GAMEDEV COMPANIES* 5% 40% 6% Rivne Kyiv 1 Lviv Poltava Kharkiv Ivano- Frankivsk Vinnitsa Kropivnitsky 2% 12% Dnipro Mykolayiv Kryviy Rih 40% of gamedev companies in Ukraine have software development offices in Kyiv. Odessa takes the second place with 16% (17 companies). Other popular cities among gamedev providers are Dnipro (12 companies), Kharkiv (11 companies) and Lviv (6 comapnies). 16% Odessa Zaporizhzhia *Only companies that participated in the survey are included
THE GAMEDEV INDUSTRY IN UKRAINE: FUNDING SOURCES AND THE NUMBER OF GAMES RELEASED The Number of Games Released 1 game 14 2-5 games 5-10 games 5 21 Funding Sources More than 10 games The company is not developing its own games 13 18 When it comes to funding, the picture is more homogeneous: more than 75% companies develop their business using money provided by their founders. The number of games The number of companies Mixed funding * The size and age of Ukrainian gamedev studios are quite diverse. 20% of the companies have only 1 game in their portfolio. At the same time, 25% have already released more than 10 games. 10 companies 14% Sector-focused investor 2 companies 7% Investor from other sector 5 companies 76% Self-funding 54 companies * A combination of self-funding and/ or funding from sector-focused investor and/or funding from other sector investor and/or crowdsourcing
THE GAMEDEV INDUSTRY IN UKRAINE: PLATFORMS, TECHNOLOGIES AND GAME GENRES Popular Platforms (companies share by platform) Android 82% Top technologies (companies by game development technologies) ios 79% PC/Mac 78% Unity 69% Web browser 4 UnrealEngine 3 VR/AR Headsets 3 HTML5 3 Xbox 27% Private game engine 27% PlayStation 25% Flash 2 Other mobile platforms Nintendo Switch Facebook 18% 18% Cocos2D CryEngine Corona Amazon Lumberyard 4% 4% 1 DEFOLD Popular game genres (companies share by games genres) NeoAxis 3D Engine Three.js CONSTRUCT2 6 44% 52% 59% 38% Action Simulators Strategies Puzzles Role-playing games
This guide has been jointly prepared by ACHIEVERS HUB and UNIT.City Innovation Park, which surveyed more than 70 Ukrainian game development companies and processed the collected data. We invite the participants of game development market to cooperate and participate in the next surveys. The information will be updated on the UNIT.City gamedev page: gamedev.unit.city. You can directly contact the authors of the guide: Olena Lobova ACHIEVERS HUB, Founder elena@a-hub.biz Roman Sudolskiy UNIT.City, Head of Content rs@unit.city LET S BUILD THE GAME DEVELOPMENT COMMUNITY IN UKRAINE TOGETHER!