Zynga Making Moves on Real Money Market

Zynga has announced plans to transition from a purely social-gaming focused company to a real-money gaming company, thanks to a deal with Bwin.party.  The first step will be the launch of real money games in the UK market.

Zynga will be teaming up with Bwin, the parent company of PartyPoker, to offero nline poker, roulette, blackjack, and slots games for the UK market, operating under Bwin’s gaming license.

Bwin CEOs Jim Ryan and Norbert Teufelberger, said “Today’s announcement is another example of our success in leveraging our assets through strategic blue chip partners”, in a joint announcement.  They added “Zynga is the world’s leader in social games with hundreds of millions of active players worldwide and a significant player base in the UK.  We are delighted to have been selected as their chosen partner for this important step in their evolution, and hope to expand our relationship into other products and markets.”

Zynga has fallen on tough times recently in the social space, and has laid off several employees from their social gaming branches as their share price fell dramatically since its IPO back in december, going from $10 to just over $2 over the course of this year. The move into the real money gaming space could be the shot in the arm that the company needs to survive in an increasingly competitive online gaming market, bringing real money gaming to audiences that would not traditionally bother to explore it.  The deal with Bwin could be highly beneficial for both of the companies involved.

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