Bigpoint GmbH is a German

video game developer A video game developer is a broad term for a software developer specializing in video game development – the process and related disciplines of creating video games. A game developer can range from one person who undertakes all tasks to a larg ...

. The company develops stand-alone browser-based games as well as

social network game A social network game (sometimes simply referred to as a social media game, social gaming, social video game or online social game) is a type of online game that is played through social networks or social media. They typically feature multiplayer ...

s. Bigpoint has over 200 million registered users (announced in June 2011). Bigpoint.com states that 337,104,419 players are registered in the top right corner, as of 10/10/13. NBCU has featured some of Bigpoint's games on the websites of some of its cable channels. In addition to its headquarters in

Hamburg Hamburg (, ; nds, label=Hamburg German, Low Saxon, Hamborg ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg (german: Freie und Hansestadt Hamburg; nds, label=Low Saxon, Friee un Hansestadt Hamborg),. is the List of cities in Germany by popul ...

, Germany, Bigpoint maintains offices in

Berlin Berlin is Capital of Germany, the capital and largest city of Germany, both by area and List of cities in Germany by population, by population. Its more than 3.85 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European U ...

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

Malta Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...

and

São Paulo São Paulo (, ; Portuguese for 'Saint Paul') is the most populous city in Brazil, and is the capital of the state of São Paulo, the most populous and wealthiest Brazilian state, located in the country's Southeast Region. Listed by the Ga ...

. Some of the company's games include

Battlestar Galactica Online ''Battlestar Galactica Online'' was a browser-based massively multiplayer online game (MMO) loosely based on the 2004 television series '' Battlestar Galactica''. Released in open beta on February 8, 2011, it was developed by Bigpoint Games and ...

, Farmerama,

Drakensang Online ''Drakensang Online'' is a freemium online role-playing video game developed and published by Bigpoint for Microsoft Windows and macOS. The title was in an open beta phase from August 2011 to July 2012. A retail version was released in November ...

DarkOrbit ''DarkOrbit'', later renamed to ''DarkOrbit: Reloaded'' is a massively multiplayer online game developed by Bigpoint Games. The game is set in outer space, where players control a spaceship to battle against non-player characters and other play ...

and Seafight. The studio was acquired by

Youzu Interactive Yoozoo Games (trading name of Youzu Interactive) is a video game developer and publisher of browser and mobile games, primarily massively multiplayer online games (MMORPG), in Asia, Europe and North America. The company was founded in 2009 by Li ...

in 2016 and continues to operate as an independent subsidiary.

History

In 2002, the company was founded by Heiko Hubertz as m.wire GmbH in

, Germany's second largest city. Heiko Hubertz started this company with a football management game in which every player transfer would cost a small amount for famous football players. Bigpoint's first game was ''Icefighter'', an ice hockey management simulation. Till the end of 2004 there were further games launched, "F1Manager" and "Fussballmanager" (Football Manager in German). In 2005 the company was renamed to e-sport GmbH. In 2006 Samwer brothers with European Founders Fund and beginning of 2007

United Internet United Internet AG is a global Internet services company headquartered in Montabaur, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. The company is structured in two business areas, ''Access'' and ''Applications,'' and has a total of 16 brands and numerous subsid ...

invested in the company. The company quickly expanded, having one million registered users in 2006. By 2007, Bigpoint was running 22 browser games. In June 2008,

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate founded in 1892, and incorporated in New York state and headquartered in Boston. The company operated in sectors including healthcare, aviation, power, renewable energ ...

and

NBC Universal The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an Television in the United States, American English-language Commercial broadcasting, commercial television network, broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Enterta ...

, along with European private-equity group

GMT Communications Partners Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) is the mean solar time at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, London, counted from midnight. At different times in the past, it has been calculated in different ways, including being calculated from noon; as a ...

, bought out a 70 percent share of Bigpoint, leaving the remaining 30 percent share under Heiko Hubertz's control. By 2009, Bigpoint reached more than 100 million users and had a revenue of more than 50 million Euros. On April 26, 2011,

TA Associates TA Associates, founded in 1968, is one of the early modern-era private equity firms in the United States. The firm leads buyouts and minority recapitalizations of profitable growth companies. TA invests across five industry groups: technology, he ...

and

Summit Partners Summit Partners is an American private equity firm based in Boston, Massachusetts. The firm focuses on investing in technology, healthcare, life sciences and other growth industries. Background Summit Partners was founded in 1984 by Roe St ...

invested $350 million into Bigpoint to become the majority shareholders. On May 16, 2011, Bigpointdotcom posted a video on YouTube.com announcing their new office building. Previous shareholders Comcast Interactive Capital's Peacock Equity Fund sold their holdings in this transaction. GMT Communications Partners and GE sold a majority of their stakes. Hubertz retained his existing ownership stake in the company. In May 2011, Bigpoint had more than 800 employees worldwide. On October 23, 2012, Bigpoint laid off 120 staff members. At the same time Heiko Hubertz stepped down as CEO. In March 2016, the developer was acquired by

( GTArcade) in an €80 million ($89.68 million) stock buyout.

Used technology

Games are developed using

PHP PHP is a General-purpose programming language, general-purpose scripting language geared toward web development. It was originally created by Danish-Canadian programmer Rasmus Lerdorf in 1993 and released in 1995. The PHP reference implementati ...

Adobe Flash Adobe Flash (formerly Macromedia Flash and FutureSplash) is a multimedia software platform used for production of animations, rich web applications, desktop applications, mobile apps, mobile games, and embedded web browser video players. Fla ...

Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's mo ...

and the

Unity engine Unity is a cross-platform game engine developed by Unity Technologies, first announced and released in June 2005 at Apple Worldwide Developers Conference as a Mac OS X game engine. The engine has since been gradually extended to support a varie ...

List of games developed by Bigpoint

* Icefighter * Fussballmanager * Gangs of Crime (formerly known as Mafia 1930) * Gladiatoren * Managergames Hockey * Managergames Soccer * Seafight * Land of Destruction *

* Chaoscars * SpeedCars * SpeedSpace *

The Pimps ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in E ...

* ActionLeague * Damoria *

K.O. Champs A knockout (abbreviated to KO or K.O.) is a fight-ending, winning criterion in several full-contact combat sports, such as boxing, kickboxing, muay thai, mixed martial arts, karate, some forms of taekwondo and other sports involving striking ...

* Gladius II * SpaceInvasion *

War of Titans War is an intense armed conflict between State (polity), states, governments, Society, societies, or paramilitary groups such as Mercenary, mercenaries, Insurgency, insurgents, and militias. It is generally characterized by extreme violenc ...

* BeBees *

Parsec The parsec (symbol: pc) is a unit of length used to measure the large distances to astronomical objects outside the Solar System, approximately equal to or (au), i.e. . The parsec unit is obtained by the use of parallax and trigonometry, a ...

* Deepolis * XBlaster * Hellblades *

ZooMumba ''ZooMumba'' was a free-to-play zoo simulator developed and published by Bigpoint where players took up the responsibility of creating and maintaining a zoo. Players started with an empty piece of land to transform into a successful zoo. Players ...

* SkyRama * PonyRama * RamaCity * AquaRama * FantasyRama *

* Kultan - The World Beyond *

The Mummy Online ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in En ...

Universal Monsters Online Universal is the adjective for universe. Universal may also refer to: Companies * NBCUniversal, a media and entertainment company ** Universal Animation Studios, an American Animation studio, and a subsidiary of NBCUniversal ** Universal TV, a t ...

* Supremacy 1914 *

Rising Cities Rising may refer to: * Rising, a stage in baking - see Proofing (baking technique) *Elevation * Short for Uprising, a rebellion Film and TV * "Rising" (''Stargate Atlantis''), the series premiere of the science fiction television program ''Starg ...

* PirateStorm

List of games published by Bigpoint

WonderKing Online ''WonderKing Online'' ( Korean: 원더킹 Japanese: ワンダーキング) was a free-of-charge, 2D, side-scrolling massively multiplayer online role-playing game created by the South Korean company ToWinGames. Gameplay ''WonderKing'' was ...

Drift City ''Drift City'' (also known as Skid Rush (스키드러쉬) in South Korea) is a massively multiplayer online racing video game developed by NPluto and sponsored by several major automotive companies such as Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, and U1 Technology ...

War Machines War is an intense armed conflict between State (polity), states, governments, Society, societies, or paramilitary groups such as Mercenary, mercenaries, Insurgency, insurgents, and militias. It is generally characterized by extreme violenc ...

* Terminator Salvation * Rise of Gods * Case White * SpaceConquer * Skaph (by Wadim Kapinos, a promotion from 2009 August) * Rangersland International * Pirates 1709 International * Wanted * 11 Manager * Arenas of Glory * Castle Fight International * Puzzle Pirates * Xhodon * Anophis * Dolumar * Generated Affixation: the Nexus Lancinate * Gameglobe

References

External links

Online Gaming Outfit Bigpoint Points To Some Big Numbers
TechCrunch June 20, 2011
The Next Wave of Free-to-Play: Licensing
Gamasutra June 16, 2011
Battlestar Galactica Online Surpasses 2 Million Players
Jostiq May 26, 2011
Investors buy majority stake in online game maker Bigpoint for $350M
VentureBeat April 25, 2011
Bigpoint Talks Drakensang Online
Massively, March 21, 2011
Bigpoint expands to US with Electronic Arts digital distribution deal
VentureBeat February 28, 2011
Bigpoint saves Planet Moon game studio with hiring binge
VentureBeat January 1, 2011
Bigpoint in €70 million buy-out
at www.growthbusiness.co.uk, June 9, 2008.

Online gaming company fetches $110 million, signifying continued interest in the space from major media companies and ongoing consumer interest., By JONATHAN MARINO, Mergers & Acquisitions Report via mergersunleashed.com, June 9, 2008.

siliconindia news bureau, June 12, 2008.

Galaxynews.com June 9, 2008. {{Authority control Browser-based game websites Browser-based multiplayer online games Video game development companies German companies established in 2002 Video game companies established in 2002 Video game companies of Germany Companies based in Hamburg