Transitioning from a Developer to a Distributor of Mobile Games: Lon Otremba, CEO of Tylted (Part 6)

Sramana: What are you doing to be a game changer in this space?

Lon Otremba: We are introducing the idea of how brands can live in our environment in ways which are appealing beyond games. We could introduce a major brand like American Express into our environment through a payment mechanism or through a virtual currency sponsored by American Express. We could introduce Ford or General Motors through a game that outfits automobiles, or we introduce a location based game such as a road rally. There are a lot of ways for brands to integrate themselves into our environment beyond an ad banner. Those are the kinds of things that are beginning to take root in mobile thinking and will be the huge tipping point for mobile ad dollars. Those are also the kinds of things that users like.

The second area is through commerce. A lot of the ability for consumers to take advantage of what is inherently unique about mobile is location. It is about connecting consumers with mobile devices through point of sale or point of purchase. That is the holy grail and it can finally happen. We know the location of every single one of our users. We know if they are on the move and have arrived somewhere. That can factor into the value chain between brands and consumers. We have patented technology for a navigable ad unit. We have patented technology to deliver games within an app, so you could play games while listening to Pandora. Those kinds of distribution strategies are the things that will shake up this space and move us out of this limited advertising cycle.

Sramana: Would you give me some examples of games from third party publishers who have been successful with monetization on your platform?

Lon Otremba: Our very first third party game just went live. We are just starting that portion of our strategy. We have deals done and the first games are getting started. The first game that went live is Bubble Dash. We have done beta tests with that, and it will continue to be a beta for us to monitor user activity.

To give you a sense of scale opportunity, Bubble Dash as a game in Europe is four times bigger than our very best game. We expect Bubble Dash to do about 20% of what it does outside of our environment. If it does that, it will exceed our best game. We believe, even conservatively, that we will far exceed the 20% number. Even if it remains 20%, then every partner that we roll out has vast user bases. We have Bushido, TweenSoft, New Game Town, and several other developers coming onto our platform.

Ultimately, what happens is we start with sizeable guys. Ultimately the critical mass of users will allow any independent developer to come onto our platform and we will set them up with a rev share. They can start making money in our ecosystem, which is our goal. We had to find initial people who could help us create critical mass with great content as well as large audiences that they could bring to us.

For folks like TinyCo this was a win-win. They get tons of downloads, but they know what the sustainability curve after download is like. Anything they can do to extend that without spending hard dollars is a win. Extending the life of an existing titles as well as the opportunity to release new titles is the value proposition and opportunity that everyone has seen. We have not had a single company give us a hard no. We have had a few people who are watching from afar and will come on board once we get going.

This segment is part 6 in the series : Transitioning from a Developer to a Distributor of Mobile Games: Lon Otremba, CEO of Tylted
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