Zynga begins pitching IPO to investors

Mark Pincus, the chief executive of social games giant Zynga, has begun pitching his company to key investors in preparation for its upcoming IPO.

VentureBeat reports that Zynga’s IPO will value the company for between $8bn and $9bn – slightly less than the already down-sized $10bn valuation touted last week.

Pincus will state that he intends to connect the world through games” and that play has become a core internet activity and is the fastest growing activity on mobile”.

He also described Zynga’s model as scalable, repeatable and profitable” – a claim that’s hard to refute when the success of titles such as CityVille and FarmVille is considered.

COO John Schappert added that he believes it’s the most powerful business model in entertainment”.

Zynga’s entire portfolio now has a total userbase of 227m MAUs and 54m DAUs. That’s more than the next 14 companies combined on Facebook are able to attract.

Pincus also claims that the overall social gaming market will double to around 1bn users within the next five years, spending between them an estimated $27bn per year. If Zynga’s market share remains static it can expect a $3bn slice of that pie.

Its current ad revenue stands at around $55m per year, which is up162 per cent year-on-year. Best Buy remains one of its strongest supporters, and in the region of 8m Best Buy stores have been built by users in CityVille.

And it’s an easy feat to repeat, Pincus argues. All Zynga has to do to create its next big hit is pick a category that will be popular with users” and adapt its existing play model accordingly. The company develops around a quarter of a title before launching it and continuing to develop over time.

Zynga stock could begin trading as early as December 16th.