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DeNA heads into Latin America with Atakama Labs acquisition

Part of masterplan to increase headcount to 1,000

DeNA heads into Latin America with Atakama Labs acquisition
Amongst others, French publisher Gameloft has pointed to the importance of emerging markets such as Latin America in its earning statements, so Japanese outfit DeNA's decision to invest in the region follows the trend.

It's just acquired the 30-strong Atakama Labs, a Santiago, Chile-based game developer.

Terms weren't disclosed, but GameBeat's Dean Takahashi reckoned it was in the order of $6 million, which seems reasonable. 

Size is everything

The studio is DeNA's first subsidiary in Latin America, and it will be put to work on its social mobile gaming platform Mobage Global, which is operated by DeNA's US arm ngmoco.

It will offer engineering support for ngmoco's first and thirdparty games. Atakama had previously worked with DeNA on porting existing games to Mobage.

"Atakama Labs' highly skilled engineers and experienced management team will be a great asset as we grow," said Neil Young, ngmoco's CEO.

DeNA currently has almost 400 staff worldwide, and plans to expand to 1,000 in the near future.

[source: DeNA]
Contributing Editor

A Pocket Gamer co-founder, Jon is Contributing Editor at PG.biz which means he acts like a slightly confused uncle who's forgotten where he's left his glasses. As well as letters and cameras, he likes imaginary numbers and legumes.