Rovio: Chinese Angry Birds Will See 100M Downloads

Angry Birds developer Rovio has announced a partnership with Chinese mobile ad network Madhouse, as a means of expanding the hit game's presence in China. Angry Birds officially launched in China in May through a partnership with Chinese mobile games network Downjoy, but sales from such official efforts in the highly-populated country have so far been dwarfed by derivative knock-offs and pirated versions on jailbroken iPhones. Rovio hopes that this partnership will help the brand to properly take off in the region, and is predicting that it will have seen 100 million downloads of Angry Birds in China by the end of 2011. China will also see Angry Birds official products popping up too, including a line of shoes based on the game at Letao, China's largest online shoe company. Peter Vesterbacka, Rovio's chief marketing officer, explained, "As we have done in all of our markets around the world, we will create products specifically for this market. Angry Birds will recognize the uniqueness of China and our Chinese fans." He continued, "We are delighted to be fully operational in China. China has great potential for growth, but just as exciting is the opportunity to build a creative franchise, a marriage of virtual and real life, that is special for China and exciting for our Chinese fans." Earlier this month, Rovio said that it was "betting everything" on the ultra-popular brand, noting that it would like to be "the first entertainment brand with a billion fans."