Pune’s Delta Corp Ltd Forays Into Online Gaming; Acquires Poker Site Adda.com For $27 Mn

Pune-based hospitality firm Delta Corp Ltd has announced that it will acquire Gauss Networks Pvt. Ltd, which operates online poker site adda52.com, in a $27 Mn (INR 182 Cr) cash and stock deal.

Gauss Networks, a software developer, and SaaS firm, owns Gaussian, the entity behind adda52.com. Add52.com was founded by IIT-Delhi graduates Anuj Gupta and Mohit Agarwal.

Founded in 2013, Gauss Networks is currently valued at around $27 Mn (182 Cr). For the financial year 2015-16 the company generated a consolidated turnover of $7 Mn (INR 47.13 Cr).

Delta Corp shall not create any treasury stock but will issue its own shares to equity holders of Gauss Networks. The initial phase of transaction is expected to be completed by June 2017 where Gauss Networks shall be merged with Delta Corp.

Gurgaon-based Gauss Networks is an online firm that claims to specialise in games like rummy, poker, chess, Scrabble, golf and pool among others. It has products including adda52.com, adda52rummy.com, and adda52mart.com to offer online versions of card games and related products.

For Delta Corp, the acquisition will mark its entry in the online gaming space. Delta Corp also runs casinos and intends to initially acquire a 26% stake in Gauss Networks Pvt. Ltd from the founders.

Founded by Jaydev Mody, Delta Corp started off as a real estate firm and gradually entered the hospitality and gaming segment in 2008. According to their website, the company claims to have three of the six issued offshore gaming licenses issued in the state of Goa for Deltin Royale, Deltin JAQK, and Deltin Caravela.

The company claims that Deltin Royale is currently India’s largest offshore gaming vessel with 950 gaming positions across 116 tables and 250 slot machines.

The digital gaming sector has received substantial attention from investors this year. According to a recent NASSCOM­ IGDA study, revenue from casual gaming in India will quadruple by 2016 to $250+ Mn. Last year, about 25 prominent games were released across platforms. The Indian gaming industry is close to $890 Mn and there are about 100 ­odd game developing firms in the country.

underDOGS, a Mumbai-based game development company, raised an undisclosed amount of funding from digital platform Intelli Reboot Digital Pvt. Ltd. In April, Reliance Entertainment announced its plans to invest in over 20 Indian gaming startups this year. The corpus of the investment fund remains undisclosed for now.  UCWeb India also announced $20 Mn fund for Indian gaming startups under its accelerator 9 Apps Dev.

Other prominent players in this space include 19Studios, Zebu Games, 99 Games, Rolocule, CreatioSoft, Games2Win and more.

This development was first reported in VcCircle.