Oberon Acquires New Eastern European Studios 2

Officials from casual games publisher Oberon Media have announced that the company has acquired two new studios in Eastern Europe: Kenjitsu in Russia and Friend Games in the Ukraine. Oberon intends to establish a major hub for the development of content and game platforms in the area, providing local developers with easy access to game production and marketing services. Kenjitsu is an outsourcing studio affiliated to Nikitova Games and located in St Petersburg in the Northwest of the country. Friends Games is based near Kiev and are best known for the game Magic Match: The Genie’s Journey. The financial terms of the acquisitions were not revealed. As a result of the acquisitions Olya Nikitova, co-founder of Kenjitsu and CEO of Nikitova Games, will join Oberon as vice president of online publishing in Eastern Europe and will oversee publishing operations from St Petersburg, where the company's new Eastern European headquarters will be based. She will also continue her existing role at Nikitova itself. Taras Tarasov, founder and president of Friends Games, will join Oberon as director of Eastern European developer relations and will manage relationships with casual game developers throughout the region. Don Ryan, senior vice president of publishing for Oberon, commented: "Eastern Europe is full of highly skilled casual game developers who have been contributing to the casual games space since its inception." "By building a robust presence in this territory, Oberon will be able to provide its developer partners with market information to make better informed decisions about product design as well as secure the broadest possible distribution across multiple platforms," he added. Oberon has acquired a number of studios and companies in recent months, the most prominent being mobile phone developer and publisher I-Play in May this year.