News
Saudi’s PIF buys $1bn stake in Sweden’s Embracer gaming group
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) is taking a stake in Swedish video game maker Embracer one month after investing in Japan’s video game giant Nintendo.
Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund made its fourth investment in the gaming sector so far this year.
PIF is investing $1 billion to purchase 99.9 million B-shares in Embracer. It is investing in its own Savvy Gaming Group (a gaming and e-sports group PIF set up in January).
Brian Ward (below), CEO of Savvy Gaming Group, said, “The Embracer team has built a truly unique and leading ecosystem of entrepreneurs and creators at a scale which we believe will continue to generate enormous value for the games community in the coming years,”
As part of Saudi Arabia’s economic diversification, Last month, the $500-billion sovereign wealth fund acquired a 5.01 percent stake in Japanese gaming company Nintendo.
The Nintendo stake follows the PIF’s recent disclosure of stakes in two other Japanese gaming companies – Nexon and Capcom, which the fund disclosed in February.
“Savvy Gaming Group will enable us to set up a regional hub in Saudi Arabia, from which we can make investments across the MENA region, organically, via partnerships, joint ventures, or via acquisitions of companies led by strong entrepreneurs.” Lars Wingefors, founder and chief executive of Embracer, commented.
“I think it’s an investment spree to diversify their portfolio out of oil and energy,” Nazih Fares, head of communications and localization at 4 Winds Entertainment, a games publisher, said.
“But when you compare it to the rest of the Gulf, especially UAE, the Saudi funds are in general a bit late on making an international impact on their ‘brand.’ Look at all the big football and other sports teams sponsored by UAE or Qatari brands, for example.”
Resume “the rush to get to that level for Saudi Arabia will take longer, but “investing directly in big brands will help catch up on that diversification of revenue generated by those same international companies.”
“The $1 billion investment is part of its strategy to have a diverse range of forward-looking shareholders who support its long-term business plans,” Fares explained.
Over the past few years, Saudi-based entities have become one of the most significant investors in the global gaming market. The games market in MENA is one of the world’s fastest-growing, with $5.7 billion in 2021 revenues and more active gamers than either the US or Western Europe.
Lars Wingefors said, “The largest country in this market, by far, is Saudi Arabia, and having visited Saudi Arabia, I have seen the gaming community and the opportunities firsthand,”
According to the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), Gaming consumption in Saudi Arabia is estimated to reach $6.8 billion by 2030.
BCG report stated, “These figures point to plenty of untapped potential as more young Saudis pursue careers in game development, management, and esports competition,”
It is worth mentioning that Last year, the PIF boosted its stake in US video game maker Activation Blizzard to $15.9 billion.
“The gaming ecosystem in the MENA region is exciting on several levels, primarily due to the sector’s expansion mechanics and growth velocity – we are experiencing sustained year-on-year growth to the tune of CAGR 15.8 percent.” Matthew Pickering, CEO of Power League Gaming (gaming and esports agency).
Combined with a youthful, hyper-engaged regional population with fast tech adoption rates and high levels of mobile penetration, this presents “exciting opportunities for further sustained development and provision of experiences by agencies and publishers alike to deliver value for gamers and brand partners and sponsors alike.”
News
Amr Diab Gets Hacked on Twitter
Amr Diab’s Facebook page has announced that his twitter account has been hijacked by anonymous and now tweeting political.
Update: Amr Diab’s Facebook Page announced that “Amr Diab’s Twitter account has been restored successfully and you can follow Amr’s tweets normally now”
Amr Diab got hacked on Twitter
On Thursday 9th of Jan, Amr Diab’s Facebook page announced that Amr Diab’s Twitter account has been hacked by anonymous and now tweeting politics!
Amr Abdul-Basset Abdul-Azeez Diab (born 11 October 1961) is an Egyptian singer and composer of pop music. He was awarded the World Music Award for Best Selling Middle East Artist, three times: 1998 for the album “Nour El Ain”, 2002 for the album “Aktrr Wahid Byhbak 2001” and 2007 for the album “El Lillady”. Amr Diab also won The African Music Awards 2009, Big Apple Music Awards; Life Achievements Awards: Best Singer of The Year in 2009, and Best Male Act in African Music Awards 2010.
He is known as the Father of Mediterranean Music He has created his own style which is often termed “Mediterranean Music” or “Mediterranean Sound”, a blend of Western and Egyptian rhythms.
In The Mediterranean in Music, David Cooper and Kevin Dawe referred to his music as “the new breed of Mediterranean music”.According to author Michael Frishkopf, Amr Diab has produced a new concept of Mediterranean music, especially in his international hit, “Nour El Ain”.
In his analysis of The Very Best of Amr Diab album, Victor W. Valdivia of All music said: “His music melded traditional Arabic sounds and textures with Western rhythms and instruments. The mesh was dubbed Mediterranean music, and The Very Best of Amr Diab displays Diab’s superb skill in creating it.”
In 1997, he won three awards at the Annual Arabic Festival: one for Best Video, for Best Song, and for Best Artist of the Year. Diab received a Triple Platinum Award for the sales of Nour El Ain and a World Music Award in Monaco.
After the success of the previously shared overall analysis of Sherine’s new album “Ana Keter” and her social media presence, we decided to fulfill your requests with more details and additional insights.
The report is from Jan 15 through Jan 31, 2014; however, starting Feb, we noticed that Sherine’s team has enhanced and developed how they engage with fans on Facebook.
Still, there’s more to do; please review the slides below to know what exactly they are missing with recommendations.
Check out the report:
Key take-outs in 15 days after the launch:
- Album gained 11 million views in 2 weeks on YouTube
- YouTube Channel subscribers boosted by 90K subscribers in 15 days out of 127K total subscribers overtime
- Buzz reached 15K tweets/RTs since the launch on Twitter
- How do people talk about the album/Sherine on Twitter?
- People are sharing songs from YouTube & SoundCloud
- +90% positive sentiment on Twitter
- Sherine’s Twitter account is excellent at spreading the news about the album’s success.
- People are tweeting the song’s lyrics.
- Sarcastic tweets about Sherine & few songs (regular) - Almost zero negativity about the album
- Album teasers on Facebook created credibility for Sherine’s page, reflected in the page results after the album’s launch in the next 15 days with 92K Interactions & 312K New Likes.
- The album received tremendous engagement on the launching date of Jan 15. However, no posts for four days after the launch negatively affected the interactions.
Recommendations:
Sherine Abdel Wahab’s Facebook page would have received double or maybe triple new likes and interactions if the improved posts’ quality; please find below the points taken:
- Long updates with no extra value-added will lead to losing your fans’ interest
- The text-only format isn’t preferred, as it is well-known that they generate less reach than other content (Facebook announcement)
- A call to action is essential to generate leads & increase engagement
- Each post has to have its visual, audio, or video so you can attract/engage your audiences
- Understand the situation and act upon it, always be relevant to the time and avoid posting irrelevant content at the wrong time.
- Revise the tone of voice in future activities.
To recap - Overall performance is average to good - Enhance your content formatting - Improve the tone of voice on all networks - Be creative to engage your fans better - Be Consistent - Start your SoundCloud account.
News
Putin, Obama war on social media starts with unfriend on Facebook
New stage of the cold war, is it?
The Social media war between Putin and Obama started with UnFriend, this is the action taken by Russian President Vladimir Putin to end the Facebook diplomacy with American president Barack Obama.
The unfriending comes after an official White House update about the possibility of a US-Syrian war. President Putin revealed that Obama’s updates about the Congressional debate on a possible war with Syria have annoyed him.
After unfriending, President Putin update status on profile “Something I should have done a long time ago”
Also, He said to Russia’s Pravda News Service “President Assad and I, we are the Facebook friends. We like the same pages, we share pictures of cute women and all that. Obama needs to lighten up on there, it’s not for serious stuff,”
President Obama’s latest posts about the possibility of the war in Syria have been reported by someone and he received a warning from Facebook that he will be prevented from posting on his profile for 24 hours.
He has also commented “Really, Putin needs to grow up. If he didn’t like that [post], he could have just hid it from his news feed instead of creating all this Facebook drama,”
JOE BIDEN “Vice President of the United States” announced to reports that President Obama has signed into his Twitter account to unfollow Putin.
The turmoil generated between Putin and Obama over their dispute on the Syrian crisis. Expanded to reach the social networks
Putin and Obama on social Networks
The question now is, are we witnessing a new stage of the cold war between the two countries, will they continue the war online instead of the military tactics and old spy war?
It’s obvious that social media is really changing the game in everything, and now it’s taking over on a very high level.
Keep an eye on Digital Boom and we will keep you posted with more news and updates on the cold war and even more…
-
Startups9 years ago3 Creative Egyptian Women Who Master E-commerce
-
News10 years ago11 Talented Egyptian Photographers on Instagram
-
Campaigns8 years agoVodafone Egypt Brings Generations Together, Unlocks 4G Power
-
Marketing9 years agoWhich categories will suffer most from increased prices in Egypt?
-
Apps8 years agoRadio Garden Live Map of The Globe’s Radio Stations
-
News8 years agoTop 10 Egyptian Fashionistas to Follow on Instagram
-
Campaigns8 years ago7 Big Stats That Show Which Ramadan Advertisements Resonated Most
-
Opinion9 years agoF*** Being a Founder, Be a Follower