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Zynga history
Zynga company history timeline
At the time, Tribe.net had just eight employees, and Cisco completed its purchase by March 2007.
Zynga's first game, Texas Hold'Em Poker, now known as Zynga Poker, was released on Facebook in July 2007.
In 2007, selling virtual goods was still a radical thing to propose, but Zynga was confident enough that they could develop this in a real business model.
According to the company, Zynga has had over one billion people play its games since its inception in 2007.
On March 7, 2008, Zynga Poker became the first game in the West to sell virtual goods at scale by allowing players to buy its poker chips.
In July 2008, the world took notice as Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers invested $29 million in Zynga.
He joined as a top game exec at Zynga in November 2008.
Zynga launched its second game, Mafia Wars, in 2008.
Zynga became the Facebook app developer with the most monthly active users in April 2009, with 40 million people playing their games that month.
On November 23, 2009, FarmVille.com went live as Zynga's first stand-alone game.
1 ranked spot on Facebook since the beginning of 2009.
In 2009, the company released its popular puzzle game Words with Friends.
In February 2010, Farmville had over 80 million players, and on May 18, 2010, Facebook and Zynga entered into a five-year relationship to expand the use of Facebook Credits in Zynga's games.
In December 2010, Zynga acquired Newtoy and Words With Friends.
Zynga filed with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to raise up to $1 billion in an initial public offering on July 1, 2011.
Zynga went public in December 2011 and was one of the first companies to ring the bell at its own headquarters.
Zynga began trading on NASDAQ on December 16, 2011.
Zynga had announced back in 2011 that they would move away with their own online platform called Project Z, though they announced that Facebook would still play a major role in marketing.
Zynga grew its player network to 300 million monthly active users (MAUs) and at its peak on Facebook, represented an estimated 20% of Facebook page views and 19% of Facebook revenue in 2011.
On June 26, 2012, during the Zynga Unleashed conference, Zynga announced the "Zynga With Friends" network, aiming to connect players of Zynga game titles across multiple platforms.
Being one of the most popular social network gaming sites, Zynga made about $329 million around 2012, becoming one of the fastest growing companies in the world at that time.
FarmVille became the company's first stand-alone game and in March 2013, Zynga formally ended its relationship with Facebook even though it was estimated that around 80% of Zynga's earnings came from Facebook users.
In June 2013, Pincus recruited Don Mattrick as CEO, who pursued a strategy of high fidelity games for mobile.
On July 25, 2013, Zynga said they would not be pursuing real money game production in the US. Following this announcement, shares dropped 13%.
In January 2014, the company announced the layoff of 314 workers, about 15% of its total workforce.
As part of this strategy, Zynga acquired NaturalMotion in February 2014, whose studios in London developed graphically rich mobile titles including our forever franchise CSR Racing.
In July 2014, Zynga signed a lease for office space in Maitland, Florida.
First quarter results for 2014 showed that daily active user numbers fell from 53 million to 28 million year-over-year.
Don Mattrick left Zynga in April 2015, replaced by predecessor Mark Pincus.
He joined Zynga's Board of Directors in August, 2015.
Frank Gibeau took over as CEO on March 7, 2016, with Pincus once again stepping aside.
As of January 2018, Zynga had 1,681 employees, approximately 80 million monthly active users, and a market capitalization of $3.39 billion.
In July 2020, Zynga acquired Peak Games, developer of Toon Blast and Toy Blast.
In October of 2021, Zynga acquired StarLark, developer of the Golf Rival franchise, the world’s second-largest mobile golf game.
On January 10, 2022, Take-Two Interactive announced its intention to acquire the company in a cash-and-stock deal with a value of $12.7 billion, with Take-Two acquiring all outstanding shares of Zynga at $9.86 apiece.
In May 2022, Zynga combined with Take-Two, bringing together best-in-class intellectual properties and a market-leading, diversified mobile publishing platform.
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Zynga competitors
| Company name | Founded date | Revenue | Employee size | Job openings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Glu Mobile | 2001 | $540.5M | 800 | 5 |
| Unity Technologies | 2006 | $1.8B | 3,379 | 448 |
| Riot Games | 2006 | $1.5B | 2,500 | 42 |
| Epic Games | 1991 | $500.0M | 1,001 | 112 |
| Jam City | 2010 | $12.0M | 825 | 12 |
| Take-Two Interactive Software | 1993 | $5.3B | 6,495 | 54 |
| Activision Blizzard | 2008 | $7.5B | 9,500 | 141 |
| Daybreak Game | 2015 | $25.0M | 450 | 14 |
| Stardock | 1991 | $15.0M | 51 | 4 |
| Scopely | 2011 | $12.5M | 1,200 | 37 |
Zynga history FAQs
Zippia gives an in-depth look into the details of Zynga, including salaries, political affiliations, employee data, and more, in order to inform job seekers about Zynga. The employee data is based on information from people who have self-reported their past or current employments at Zynga. The data on this page is also based on data sources collected from public and open data sources on the Internet and other locations, as well as proprietary data we licensed from other companies. Sources of data may include, but are not limited to, the BLS, company filings, estimates based on those filings, H1B filings, and other public and private datasets. While we have made attempts to ensure that the information displayed are correct, Zippia is not responsible for any errors or omissions or for the results obtained from the use of this information. None of the information on this page has been provided or approved by Zynga. The data presented on this page does not represent the view of Zynga and its employees or that of Zippia.
Zynga may also be known as or be related to Zynga, Zynga Inc, Zynga Inc. and Zynga, Inc.