MUMBAI: Indian mobile gaming and eSports company, Mobile Premier League (MPL) is all set to complete a successful round of funding involving Indonesian tech start-up Go-Jek, which is valued at $30 million, Economic Times reports.
Should the deal get confirmed, this will be a massive boost for MPL, which raised $5 million two months ago in a Series A round from Sequoia Capital, increasing the start-up’s capital to $150 million.
MPL’s earlier investors have been BeeNext Ventures and Times Internet. The company was founded by Sai Kiran and Shubham Malhotra earlier this year.
“Go-Jek is moving beyond transportation and wants to be like a super app in Indonesia and neighbouring countries. They could look to take MPL international as they expand into southeast Asian markets,” a source was quoted as saying to ET.
MPL claims to be the largest mobile gaming platform in India offering its user real cash for winning skill-based game tournaments such as cricket, puzzles and crosswords among others. Its Android app has more than 1 million downloads.
Go-Jek’s gamble on MPL is a significant change of market positioning for the Indonesian company, which has earlier been associated as a super app for taxi bookings, healthcare, infrastructure and technology.
The online gaming industry in India, which currently stands at $290 million in size, is expected to grow to $1 billion by 2021, according to a Google-KPMG report. The industry sees an improvement in paying propensity by 2021 courtesy low cost smartphones and a greater focus on regional content amongst an increasing domestic game developer base through heightened interest in the masses.
