In February of last year, the Swedish mobile powerhouse Modern Times Group (MTG) completed a $620 million purchase of Plarium, the developer behind the blockbuster hero‑collection title Raid: Shadow Legends. That deal, however, is only the opening move in a broader expansion plan, according to MTG’s president and chief executive, Maria Redin.
Redin told GamesIndustry.biz that the company set a bold vision after the Plarium acquisition: “We want to double our size again.” She added that organic growth will continue to be a priority, but that achieving the target will require “more acquisitions.” The timeline she outlined is aggressive – the aim is to reach the doubling milestone within three to five years. MTG has already demonstrated the ability to scale quickly; Redin noted that a similar ambition set in 2021 resulted in the group tripling its size.
The mobile gaming market, which a few years ago was expanding at double‑digit rates, has now settled into single‑digit growth as the sector matures. What was once a blue‑ocean landscape has become increasingly competitive, forcing companies to capture market share from rivals or absorb them outright. While buying studios is relatively straightforward, integrating them successfully is notoriously difficult, with many failed mergers ending in studio closures. Redin insists that MTG has a clear roadmap to avoid those pitfalls.
Before the Plarium deal, MTG already owned a portfolio of mobile studios, including InnoGames (Forge of Empires), Snowprint (Warhammer 40,000: Tacticus), Hutch (F1 Clash), Ninja Kiwi (Bloons TD 6) and Futureplay (Merge Gardens). These studios were grouped into two “districts”: the Casual District and the Midcore District – the latter covering games that sit between casual and hardcore experiences. The districts have since been rebranded as Playsimple and Playamp.
Playsimple, named after the India‑based WordTrip studio, focuses on free‑to‑play, ad‑supported titles, while Playamp concentrates on games that generate revenue primarily through in‑app purchases, which now represent the bulk of MTG’s earnings. Redin says the rebranding is more than a cosmetic change; it reflects a strategic push to create “one of the leading gaming villages.” The term “village” is intended to evoke a sense of community and belonging, helping to retain talent after acquisitions. “People are our biggest asset,” she explained, “and we must build an environment where they can thrive. When we acquire a studio, we want the founders and their teams to stay on board because that’s when the real story begins – scaling the business together.” A key element of the integration effort is the standardisation of technology and tools across the group.
Redin has been championing this approach since she became CEO in 2020, but she notes that the Plarium acquisition gave MTG the scale needed to roll it out fully. The plan is not to force every studio to use the same stack, however. “Playsimple and its tech stack will form the foundation for future casual studios,” she said, “while for Midcore we’re selectively adopting parts of Plarium’s suite where they add the most value.” This selective rollout aims to avoid the kind of disruption seen at Electronic Arts when it mandated the Frostbite engine across all its studios.
Plarium’s GoGame marketing platform and product‑detail‑page (PDP) data system are already being shared across MTG, with additional features being added to enhance their utility. Redin believes that a unified tech backbone will enable the group’s studios to achieve “the biggest bang for our buck.” She highlighted that the Playamp division will be “supercharged” by a common suite of tools, elevating the work already being done by the individual studios. Artificial intelligence is another pillar of MTG’s growth strategy.
The company is following a broader industry trend of embedding generative AI into the production pipeline. InnoGames, for example, has been using AI‑generated content for its mobile title Sunrise Village and plans to expand that capability. Redin said AI is being layered onto existing workflows for tasks such as A/B testing, graphics creation, quality assurance and analytics.
Successful AI solutions from individual studios are being incorporated into the shared Plarium tech suite, allowing rapid diffusion of best practices. When asked whether AI could eventually replace human creativity, Redin was cautious. “I don’t think AI will do everything we do,” she said. “Our talent’s creativity is still the core driver.
But if we ignore AI, we will fall behind competitors. AI can help us overcome capacity shortfalls and accelerate development without sacrificing the creative vision.” She cited examples such as code generation, art assistance and advanced logic as areas where AI already adds value. Revenue-wise, about 80 % of MTG’s income now comes from the Playamp division, with the remaining 20 % generated by Playsimple.
Redin expressed a desire to broaden both sides of the business. “We bought Snowprint a few years ago; if we could find five more studios like Snowprint worldwide, that would be fantastic,” she said. On the casual side, she hopes to add more studios to Playsimple and eventually create a third “district” that leverages the group’s core capabilities in marketing and data.
Despite the market’s maturity, Redin believes the top‑ten mobile games remain remarkably stable year after year. “Our thesis from day one has been to invest in evergreen IPs,” she explained. While titles like Raid: Shadow Legends have many years of life left, MTG still recognises the need for a fresh pipeline. Plarium is preparing to soft‑launch a new game early next year, and Redin stressed that without new releases, studios would lose the creative spark that fuels long‑term success.
Industry observers such as Supercell’s Ilkka Paananen warn that the western mobile market is “coasting,” with only a handful of new billion‑dollar games emerging from the West since 2020. Nonetheless, Redin remains optimistic. “We have three billion gamers worldwide,” she said. “The market is still compelling, even if growth has slowed to low‑single‑digit or mid‑single‑digit percentages.
To exceed that baseline we must continue to nurture our evergreen franchises while also bringing new experiences to players.” In summary, MTG’s roadmap under Maria Redin’s leadership combines aggressive acquisition, thoughtful integration, unified technology platforms, and AI‑enhanced production. By fostering a collaborative “gaming village,” standardising tools where it makes sense, and balancing the development of both proven and new IPs, the company aims to double its size within the next few years while staying competitive in an increasingly crowded mobile landscape.