GameDuell

GameDuell is a major cross-platform games community headquartered in Berlin, Germany. With more than 130 million registered players across all platforms^[1] the company counts among the leading casual and social games providers in the Western world. Founded in 2003 by Kai Bolik, Michael Kalkowski and Boris Wasmuth GameDuell offers over 70 casual online games, mostly developed in-house, such as Fluffy, Maya Pyramid, Bubble Speed, Jungle Jewels and game classics like Hearts, Solitaire and Pool. Over 60 web games are directly playable on the company’s game website. Besides that the company offers games for Facebook, for tablets and smartphones.^[2] GameDuell employs 150 team members, most of them in their Berlin headquarters.

History

The GameDuell GmbH was founded in December 2003 by Boris Wasmuth, Kai Bolik and Michael Kalkowski^[3] and published its first German web games in 2004. In 2007 GameDuell entered the French market with the first translated games. Following the launch of localized game versions in several other European countries such as United Kingdom, Spain, Netherlands and Sweden, the company entered the North American market in 2008 and opened an office in San Francisco. GameDuell meanwhile offers its games in seven languages: German, French, English, Dutch, Swedish, Danish and Spanish.

In 2009 the company published its first Facebook game Bubble Popp. With Jungle Jewels the company released a first iOS mobile game for iPads and iPhones in 2010, which was followed by an Android version in 2011. In January 2012 GameDuell moved to its current headquarter office in Taubenstraße 24-25 in Berlin-Mitte, Germany.

In 2014 GameDuell published the mobile and Facebook app Belote.com, which allows French card game fans to play Belote on Android, iOS and Facebook. The game was extended with regular international tournaments called Coupe du Monde in 2016.^[4]

In February 2016 GameDuell launched the Gin Rummy mobile game Grand Gin Rummy.^[5]

Management

Kai Bolik, Co-Founder and CEO Earlier in his career he worked in various management positions at Bertelsmann and as a strategic consultant at the Boston Consulting Group.

Boris Wasmuth, Co-Founder and Marketing Director

Boris Wasmuth is a serial entrepreneur who founded dooyoo.de in 1999, one of Europe's leading consumer sites. Prior to working with GameDuell, he worked for BMW, Henkel and Bertelsmann. Boris Wasmuth is also member of the supervisory board at media.net Berlin-Brandenburg.^[6]

Michael Kalkowski, Co-Founder and Creative Director

Michael Kalkowski started his ventures as one of the founders of dooyoo.com.^[7] Before he worked as an international product and marketing consultant. He holds several business degrees from Germany and an MBA from Eastern Illinois University (USA).

Figures

According to AppData, as of February 2012, GameDuell games on Facebook had almost 4 million monthly active users.^[8] GameDuell has over 130 million users including app installs and currently offers: 10 mobile games on the iOS and 5 on the Android platforms, 10 on the social network site Facebook and over 60 on its own website. Games are currently available in 7 different languages on its website.^[9]

Funding

The Company received over $17 million (€11 million) in funding from Wellington Partners in an effort to accelerate its expansion into other European countries and the United States. This was in addition to the earlier funding from Holtzbrinck Ventures and Burda Digital Ventures in 2004.^[10]

GameDuell Game Website and Community Platform

The GameDuell web platform is the central hub for a community of over 130 million players worldwide. Players find over 60 games on gameduell.com directly playable in the web browser. Instead of playing alone at their computer, players meet in the central game lobby of each game and start multiplayer matches against human opponents. The GameDuell matchmaking system always suggests players of the same experience and skill level to guarantee a fun experience and fair play. After their initial registration players can create avatars for their account, make friends through a buddy system, challenge other players or start closed game rounds and compete for awards and rankings. A chat function allows for direct communication in most GameDuell games.

GameDuell Events

GameDuell TechTalk

Since 2010 GameDuell has established the TechTalk event series,^[11] where renowned technology pioneers share their know-how with the Berlin tech community. Senior technology experts like Ed Burns, JSF specification lead at Oracle, Werner Vogels, CTO of Amazon, Emil Eifrem, Founder of Neo Technology, Dr. Torsten Lodderstedt, member of the OAuth working group of IETF and tech manager at Deutsche Telekom, Matthias Weßendorf, member of the Apache Software Foundation, working for JBoss/Red Hat, Jeanfrancois Arcand, developer of the Atmosphere framework, introduce the audience to their working fields and inspire the discussion with their perspective on trend-setting technology sectors.

Berlin 2.0

Every six months GameDuell invites the one hundred most influential and successful founders of the Berlin startup community to an exclusive networking dinner. At Berlin 2.0 the founders of the most promising tech and internet companies meet for a casual exchange.^[12]

Skat & Rommé Masters

Since 2006 GameDuell hosts the largest Skat tournament of the world every year.^[13] The event series is organized in exclusive partnership with the German Skat Association. Throughout the year players of the popular German card game compete in qualification rounds on the GameDuell web platform. Additionally to the Skat Masters, GameDuell launched the Rommé Masters tournament series in 2009. Only the best players of both games qualify for the live finals in Berlin where they compete face-to-face for valuable trophies. The final round is recorded and televised on German TV. For the French card game Belote and German Doppelkopf GameDuell is offering similar large-scale tournament series online.

References

External links

• Company Website