2010

Stillfront is founded

In 2010, Stillfront was founded by Jörgen Larsson, a Swedish serial entrepreneur with a background from founding several gaming and technology companies. Jörgen’s vision with Stillfront was to build a well-diversified portfolio of long life-cycle games by acquiring independent gaming studios and letting these operate independently within the same group. By applying modern portfolio theory and focusing on a diversified portfolio of games with a long lifetime value, the company would be able to sustain healthy revenue levels, while providing sufficient cash-flow for developing and financing new launches and acquisitions. The first companies acquired included Gamerock AB, Verrano AB and Coldwood Interactive AB.

2012

The early days

Stillfront Group started to operate under the operational structure it has today. In November the same year, Stillfront acquired 100% of the shares in Power Challenge. Power Challenge develops and publishes mobile and browser-based social sports management games, earning revenue through a free-to-play model with in-game purchase options. The acquisition strengthened Stillfront’s game portfolio with the game titles ManagerZone and Power Soccer.

2013

The Bytro strategy

In November 2013, Stillfront announced it had acquired 51% of Bytro Labs and entered into an agreement to acquire the remaining 49% by 2016. The addition of Bytro further expanded Stillfront’s games portfolio with titles such as Supremacy 1914, PanzerWars and Industry Tycoon and strengthened the company within the strategy game genre.

2015

The public era begins

In January 2015, Coldwood Interactive entered into a partnership with Electronic Arts regarding the development of Unravel. Unravel is a puzzle platform game for PC, Sony PlayStation and Microsoft Xbox. The game was awarded more than 20 awards at the leading games trade fairs E3 and Gamescom the same year.

In May 2015, Gladiators Online, the first game on Dorado’s new action management engine was released. Bytro’s game Call of War was released the same month, quickly becoming Stillfront’s most successful game release at the time.

In December 2015, Stillfront successfully completed an IPO and listed its shares on NASDAQ First North Stockholm. The listing price was SEK 39 per share and the first day of trading was December 8th, 2015.

2016

Acquisition of Simutronics and Babil

In June 2016, Stillfront announced its acquisition of the majority of shares in Simutronics, one of the longest-running independent game development studios in North America. Simutronics, based in St Louis, Missouri developed MUD-style text-based games GemStone IV and DragonRealms, as well as mobile games Tiny Heroes, One Epic Knight and Lara Croft Relic Run. With the acquisition, Stillfront added both a new strategy genre, as well as mobile game expertise to the group.

In December 2016, Stillfront acquired Babil Games, the leading MENA region mobile games publisher. Babil Games is a mobile strategy games publisher that focuses on bringing high quality entertainment to the Arabic audience in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.

2017

eRepublik Labs joins the group

In May 2017, Stillfront Group acquired eRepublik Labs, co-founded by Alexis Bonte and George Lemnaru in 2007. The acquisition added game titles like eRepublik.com, Age of Lords and World at War: WW2 Strategy MMO to the group.

In June the same year, the listing of Stillfront’s shares was moved to NASDAQ First North Premier Growth Market.

2018

Creating a European gaming champion

In January 2018, Stillfront completed the acquisition of Goodgame Studios, creating a European gaming champion. Goodgame Empire, Empire: Four Kingdoms, Big Farm and Big Farm: Mobile Harvest are among the biggest strategy games of all time, all developed by Goodgame Studios.

In October the same year, Stillfront acquired Imperia Online, a leading game developer and publisher in Southeastern Europe with focus on long term gamer relations. The company’s flagship title is Imperia Online, a medieval Massively multiplayer online (MMO) strategy game, published on both browser and mobile platforms. In the same month, Babil Games launched the Arab Gamers’ League.

Further, in December 2018, Stillfront acquired Playa Games, a leading casual strategy game developer and publisher in Germany. The company’s flagship title is Shakes & Fidget, a cartoon style massive multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) strategy game, published on both browser and mobile platforms.

Image: Goodgame Studios’ headquarter

2019

3x growth vision

In 2019, Stillfront started working on a plan to better prepare the company for its future growth journey. The company built and implemented a new operational platform aimed at a three times larger Stillfront within five years – the Stillfront 3x vision. As a part of this development, Stillfront expanded its group management team during the year and appointed several new key individuals to the team.

During the summer of 2019, Stillfront acquired KIXEYE, a leading developer and publisher of massively multiplayer online real-time strategy games (MMORTS) for PC and mobile devices. The acquisition further strengthened Stillfront’s portfolio of games with the successful titles Battle Pirates, War Commander, Vega Conflict and War Commander: Rogue Assault.

In November the same year, Stillfront held its Capital Markets Day where it presented the results of the 3x vision and its updated financial targets and plan for the company to triple its revenues from SEK 1.3 billion in 2018 to SEK 4 billion by the end of 2022.

Image: Tändstickspalatset, the location of the first CMD.

2020

From 12 to 18 studios

During 2020, the Stillfront family grew from 12 to 18 studios, making significant progress in its ambition to become the leading free-to-play powerhouse of gaming studios. With the acquisitions of Storm8 and Candywriter during the spring, Stillfront added new types of games to the existing games portfolio, addressing a larger share of the total gaming audience and further diversifying its revenue streams.

Following the acquisitions of Storm8, Stillfront implemented a new, improved structure of how the company works with and report on its game portfolio, increasing the focus on the games with the highest potential for growth and longevity.

During the second half of the year, Stillfront announced the acquisitions of Nanobit, Everguild, Sandbox Interactive and Super Free Games.

With the six new studios and the twelve existing ones as a part of Stillfront, the company had taken large steps towards reaching its long-term financial growth targets, while providing further platform and genre diversification and enabling additional collaboration projects across the studios.

At the end of 2020, Stillfront’s portfolio of active games consisted of some 50 titles, divided across the three product areas Strategy; Simulation, RPG & Action; and Casual & Mash-up.

2021

Entering Nasdaq Stockholm

Early 2021, Stillfront acquired Moonfrog Labs, a game studio focusing on board and social card games. With the acquisition, Stillfront added a highly profitable and successful studio and expanded its geographic footprint to the Indian Subcontinent, a strategic move into one of the fastest growing mobile game markets worldwide.

In May, Stillfront acquired Game Labs, a game studio with a strong track record of developing strategy and action games for PC. With the acquisition, Stillfront strengthened its position in the converging games market and was able to add valuable niche genre competence in the strategy and action genre.

Later in May, Stillfront completed its transfer from Nasdaq First North Premier Growth Market to the main market of Nasdaq Stockholm. As of May 26th, Stillfront’s shares are traded in the Large Cap Segment on Nasdaq Stockholm.

In September, Stillfront acquired Jawaker, a social gaming network that hosts over 40 of the most popular Middle Eastern social and cultural games, further strengthening Stillfront’s presence in the strategically important and fast-growing MENA region.

2022

Expansion into the important Japanese market

Beginning of 2022, Stillfront acquired Six Waves Inc., a leading publisher of mobile free-to-play strategy games in Japan. With the acquisition, Stillfront intends to establish a strong foothold in East Asia and significantly strengthen Stillfront’s presence in the attractive Japanese gaming market. 

Following the acquisition, Stillfront finalized a rights issue with preferential rights for existing shareholders of approximately SEK 2.0 billion. The net proceeds were used to repay the temporary increase in debt that the acquisition of 6waves entailed and to strengthen the balance sheet after the acquisition, and thereby increased Stillfront’s financial flexibility in order to take advantage of future acquisition opportunities in line with Stillfront’s growth strategy.

2023

Going into 2023, Stillfront entered a new phase: Stillfront IV

Going into 2023, Stillfront entered a new phase: Stillfront IV. With the new phase, Stillfront’s ambition is to further leverage the scale that the company has built during the past three years to continue to build the best games company in the world. Stillfront’s new phase was communicated in February 2023 at a digital Capital Markets Day.