Aonic on the state of games investment in 2025 and tips for raising funds

Amid a tough few years for the games industry, one of the big questions for many studio founders and heads is: where is the investment coming from?

At Develop: Brighton, I hosted a fireside chat with Aonic co-founder and chief product officer Olliver Heins entitled ‘How to Raise Games Investment in 2025’ to find some answers to that question.

Swedish Games Group Aonic was founded in 2021 and has acquired a number of small to mid-sized companies, including nDreams, Red Games Co, TutoToons, OtherSide Entertainment, Exmox, and more.

The company’s leadership has experience on both sides of the investment coin, funding studios and raising its own rounds. In December 2024, it received €152 million ($160m)for M&A and to support its current portfolio.

Asked how that latest came around, Heins says around $50 million came from previous investors, with about $100m from new parties. Aonic company was profitable, still believes in opportunities in the market, and felt it could attract additional capital. The team thought it would take three to four months to raise the funds. It took a year.

“We started with the first meeting in January 2024 and I think we signed the investment in December 2024. So 12 months, 150 meetings, and that’s not including meetings internally,” he says.

Heins adds that during its own investment round, the team talked with a number of investors that hadn’t worked with the industry before, which meant it had to explain the opportunities in games available to them.

“Lots of people still have the understanding that games is only super hit-driven,” he states.

“Most investors, they know Fortnite, they know GTA, but they don’t know there’s a game called Hades which sells millions of copies. They don’t know a game like Peak … and we have shown them lots of these stories, and how successful they can be without costing $200 million in development costs.”

State of investment

Discussing the overall state of investment in the games industry in 2025, Heins says funding is coming back, but it’s much more selective.

“They’re much more focused on doing the right due diligence,” he says. “Years ago you could go to an investor and say ‘hey, I used to work for Blizzard 20 years ago’, ‘oh, here’s your cheque’. The games industry, particularly with Covid, was so hyped, it was very easy to get big, big investments.

“Now, you still can get big investments, but they also learned they need to be knowledgeable about the industry. When you talk now to an investor, they really know deep about the games industry. They know about failures and they know about success, they ask much more questions about the market, they want to know what’s your go-to market plan.”

Heins adds that the biggest difference to years ago is that, ideally, companies seeking investment need something to show something tangible like a playable, not just a pitch deck.

“You need to have a prototype or demo, or at least a video,” he explains. “You can still raise money without it if you have the right CV and the right network. But if you want to raise money and you haven’t been the CEO of another games company, you haven’t got one or two top hits on your CV or in your portfolio, then you need to just simply come with a far more advanced pitch.

“I think we get around 200 to 300 pitch decks per month, and that’s just the ones I get forwarded.”

Investment advice

Below I’ve rounded up some quickfire investment tips from the session.

Red flags: 

• Heins says the most common mistake in pitches is the lack of research and understanding of the market, particularly when it comes to how competitive the space.

How to reach out: 

• Publishers usually have forms on their website where you can submit games.

• LinkedIn is a good source for outreach.

• Lists are available online of publishers and investors. These include the Financier List from Fundamentally Games. “You can find them easily online, then you just need to write a lot of messages.” 

• Conferences are good for networking, but it’s not easy to find the right people.

• Finding investors can take a lot of initial outreach, says Heins. “When I raised money for my first company, I contacted 700 different investors in three months”.

Presentation decks

• Heins advised creating different pitch decks that are more tailored to certain investors. “I think we did at least 30 / 40 different versions.”

• On initial outreach, company leaders might consider attaching a teaser deck focused on: who you are, what you want to do, why you want to do it, and why it’s good. Not more than 10 pages.

• Attach a link at the end of outreach to a more detailed deck, with an opportunity to chat if an investor would like to know more.

• “I don’t have unlimited time and it helps if it’s small and compact”.

General tips:

• Heins says the industry is at a point where there are 40 releases on Steam a day. “You need to stand out. You need to have a product which grabs the audience.”

• If you want to build games, have your own company and no mindset to sell the business - you should not talk to VCs as there will be a need to sell at some point. Instead, you should talk to strategic investors (e.g. Miniclip, Jagex), or private investments.

• If founders want to sell but don’t want the pressure of VC, private equity is getting more into games, but they are more focused on big cheques.

• Come with a reasonable budget. “If you come now and want a budget of $50 million, that’s just not realistic at the moment. So be reasonable with your ask. Be prepared with what you want to do, not just have a great idea. What’s the competition? What’s the saturation of the genre? Who’s out there? How easy is that? How competitive is it?”