Nazara acquires 55% stake in ad tech company Datawrkz

18 Jan 2022 , 11:17 AM

On Tuesday, Nazara Technologies Ltd. announced the acquisition of a 55% stake in programmatic advertising and monetization company Datawrkz valuing the company up to Rs 225 Cr, linked to FY 22 EBITDA performance.

Nazara will be acquiring a 33% stake worth Rs 60cr in the first tranche by April 2022, of which Rs 35cr is partly payable in cash and the balance of Rs 25cr will either be paid in swap shares or cash. Nazara also reserves an option to acquire an additional 22% stake in the second tranche which will be completed by Q4 FY’23.

“We, at Nazara, are looking to build strong gaming ad tech offerings globally with the partnership with Datawrkz. We strongly believe that growth of gaming-focused ad tech will be exponential in the coming decade across geographies with the growth of gamers and game publishers across freemium, web3.0, and skill-based real money gaming,” expressed Manish Agrawal, CEO Nazara Technologies.

He further added, “Ad tech companies with deep data processing capabilities and first-party data ownership will emerge as winners in gaming-focused ad tech and will help Datawrkz to create value for itself as well as for Nazara shareholders.”

Having acquired multiple companies over the past few years, Nazara has placed itself in a leading position in esports, interactive gaming, and gamified early learning space with the ‘Friends of Nazara’ network.

Datawrkz is a technology-based global advertising firm highly focused on accelerating user and revenue growth for clients through revolutionizing digital advertising. It has offices in India, Singapore, and US and functions as an Independent Trading Desk to power digital media strategy, planning, and execution. On the supply front, Datawrkz generates higher revenue for publishers through AdPrimus, it’s Supply Side product that generates higher user engagement, balances demand sources, and enables audience segmentation.

Nazara’s share opened at Rs 2,469 against previous closing price of Rs 2,455.20, up by Rs 13.8. It was trading at Rs 2,419.15 at 11:21 A.M. It touched intraday high and  low of Rs 2,469 and Rs 2,360.05.