Hyderabad based gaming co 7Seas Technologies has inked a two-way deal with games distributor GreyStripe. To begin with, 7Seas will provide seven games to Greystrip to distribute alongwith its catalog of games - Neetu-The Alien Killer, Kraze, Derby 3D, Treasure Trove, Great Elude, 3D SuDoKu, Planets of SuDoKu 3D. 7Seas will also distribute Greystripes games through 7Seas’ mobile web portal Mobzill.com. Reliance Entertainment company Zapak had earlier tied up with Greystripe for a similar offering…how is what 7Seas is offering to its users any different from what Zapak is offering?
Greystripe competes with Hovr, which has a similar business model.
How GreyStripe And Hovr Operate…
Greystripe and its competitor Hovr are essentially building a GPRS based advertising network around free mobile games. They’re allowing users access to free mobile games, and the network delivers advertisements to the the handset. These ads are served up before and after the game. Some thoughts on their business model:
– Quality matters more than quantity: whether Greystripe has 900 games or 300, the quality of the games matters more than the quantity. The quantity should be a means of aggregating the long tail, but having 5 versions of street fighter doesn’t help. Also, the more the number of games, the more difficult it becomes to discover quality content. Even if the games are free, what brings a user back to try out more games? Quality.
– Scale is key: it’s important for Hovr and Greystripe to get as many users on board as possible. The media tie-ups with the likes of NDTV, Indiatimes and even 7Seas are just a means of expanding the user base, and reducing marketing spends for an advertising revenue share. Ideally, you’d expect quality content to be viral, particularly if it is free…
– Operator tie-ups? Perhaps it’s a better idea for Hovr or Greystripe to tie-up with mobile operators…who can offer them the scale that media houses cannot. The problem is that mobile operators are not likely to be interested, because free games would compete with their own mobile game decks, with paid games. It is unlikely that operators would enter into such a deal without a minimum guarantee, since the advertising revenue stream is not guaranteed.
Do you think advertisers would be interested in advertising on a platform provided by Greystripe or Hovr?
Related:
– Zapak Adds Single Player Mobile Games From Greystripe
– NDTV Active Gets Mobile Games From Hovr
