In February of the previous year, Sweden’s mobile powerhouse Modern Times Group (MTG) completed a $620 million acquisition of Plarium, the developer behind the blockbuster hero‑collection title Raid: Shadow Legends. According to Maria Redin, MTG’s president and chief executive officer, that deal was only the opening move in a much larger plan. Redin told GamesIndustry.biz that the company’s vision, set out last year, is to double its size again after the Plarium purchase.
“We want to keep driving organic growth, but to do that we’ll need to make further acquisitions,” she said. The target timeline is aggressive – roughly three to five years – yet the firm has already demonstrated the ability to scale quickly. Redin noted that MTG set a similar growth ambition in 2021 and succeeded in tripling its size. The mobile gaming sector, which a few years ago was expanding at double‑digit rates, has now slowed to single‑digit growth, signalling a maturing market.
What was once a blue‑ocean landscape has become increasingly crowded, and further expansion now often means taking market share from rivals or absorbing them entirely. Acquiring companies is the easy part; integrating them is where many firms stumble. The industry is littered with stories of botched mergers that resulted in studio closures. MTG, however, believes it has a clear integration playbook.
Before buying Plarium, MTG already owned a portfolio of mobile studios, including InnoGames (creator of Forge of Empires), Snowprint (Warhammer 40,000: Tacticus), Hutch (F1 Clash), Ninja Kiwi (Bloons TD 6), and Futureplay (Merge Gardens). These studios were split into two “districts”: the Casual District and the Midcore District – the latter covering games that sit between purely casual and hardcore experiences.
The districts have since been renamed Playsimple and Playamp. Playsimple, named after the India‑based WordTrip studio, groups together free‑to‑play, ad‑supported titles, while Playamp houses the in‑app‑purchase‑driven games that now form the bulk of MTG’s revenue.
Redin says the rebranding is more than cosmetic; the goal is to create “one of the leading gaming villages.” The phrasing is intentional, aiming to foster a sense of community that encourages staff to stay and thrive. “Gaming is the perfect marriage of creativity and data‑driven decisions,” she explained. “People are our biggest asset, but we must also provide an environment where they can flourish. When we acquire a studio, we want the founders and their teams to remain after the deal because that’s when the real story begins – scaling the business together.” A key element of the post‑Plarium integration has been the standardisation of technology and tools across MTG’s network.
Redin has pursued this approach since becoming CEO in 2020, but she says the scale achieved after the Plarium deal finally allowed the vision to be fully realised. The company is careful not to repeat the mistakes of other large publishers. For instance, Electronic Arts’ forced adoption of the Frostbite engine caused significant friction for studios working on titles such as Mass Effect. MTG instead recognises that the tech stack required for Playsimple’s casual games differs markedly from that needed for Playamp’s midcore offerings, and therefore treats the two divisions separately.
"Playsimple’s tech foundation will become the template for any future casual‑district acquisitions," Redin noted. "For the midcore side we have selected parts of Plarium’s technology suite to roll out group‑wide, but we are doing it selectively to ensure the end result benefits all studios.
We performed a thorough internal assessment to decide where collaboration makes sense and where it does not." Plarium’s GoGame marketing platform and product‑detail‑page (PDP) data system are already being deployed across MTG, with additional features and functionality being added. The intent is to boost studio productivity and ensure that investment yields the highest possible return. "We want to focus our efforts where we get the biggest bang for our buck," Redin said.
"We have talented game makers across the group, and with Playamp we aim to super‑charge them with a robust tech suite that elevates everything they already do." Generative AI is another area where MTG is making headway. InnoGames, for example, has been using AI‑generated content for its mobile title Sunrise Village for some time and is now looking to broaden AI‑driven creation across its portfolio.
Redin observes that AI integration is a common trend throughout the mobile industry. "Most of the people I talk to are having similar discussions about how to incorporate new technology into our production pipelines," she said, adding that generative AI is "significantly more powerful than any tool we’ve had before." The company’s AI strategy focuses on layering intelligent tools onto existing workflows – from A/B testing and graphic creation to quality assurance. Successful AI solutions pioneered in individual MTG studios are being folded into the broader Plarium tech suite and rolled out company‑wide. Redin emphasises the importance of allowing each studio to experiment within a unified AI framework, then sharing learnings so that breakthroughs can be scaled quickly.
When asked whether AI will eventually replace human creativity, Redin was cautious. "I don’t think AI can do everything we do," she said. "Our talent’s imagination is still something AI can’t replicate.
But if we ignore AI, we risk falling behind competitors. Embracing it lets us maintain our creative edge while accelerating development and improving quality." Currently, about 80 % of MTG’s revenue stems from the Playamp division, with the casual Playsimple side contributing roughly 20 %. Redin is eager to grow both sides.
She cites the recent acquisition of Snowprint and says that finding “five more Snowprints around the world” would be ideal. Although Playsimple is presently a single studio, MTG hopes to add more casual developers and perhaps even a third “district” in the future, centred on core capabilities such as marketing platforms or data analytics.
Despite the market’s maturity, Redin believes the top‑ten mobile games remain remarkably stable year after year, reinforcing MTG’s long‑standing belief in evergreen intellectual properties. While Raid: Shadow Legends still has many years of revenue potential, the company also recognises the necessity of a fresh pipeline.
Plarium is preparing to soft‑launch a new title early next year, and Redin stresses that new games are essential to preserve studio DNA, creativity, and passion. The broader industry context is challenging. Supercell’s Ilkka Paananen has warned that the western mobile market is “coasting,” noting that only two of the 22 mobile games surpassing $1 billion in revenue since 2020 originated in the West.
Even Supercell’s own incubation efforts have struggled, with projects like Squad Busters being discontinued after a brief launch. Redin acknowledges these difficulties but maintains that investment in both proven evergreen IPs and fresh titles is the only way to sustain growth. In summary, MTG is navigating a saturated, slowly expanding market by pursuing a dual strategy: consolidating and standardising its existing portfolio while actively seeking new acquisitions and leveraging cutting‑edge technologies such as AI. Redin’s vision of a cohesive “gaming village” aims to retain talent, foster collaboration, and ultimately drive the company toward its ambitious goal of doubling in size within the next few years.