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Technology

The Mystery Company Behind ‘World of Warships’

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published
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The Mystery Company Behind ‘World of Warships’

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By now, a huge number of Americans must have seen the online banner ads for the “World of Warships” game, which is free. Presently, these ads are are nearly ubiquitous. The download requires the new player’s email address, which is presumably very valuable all by itself (as the games is free). The game is made and marketed by Wargaming Public Co. Ltd., based in Cypress. It apparently is a holding company, which owns a portion of the nation’s largest bank.

The company also distributes “World of Tanks” and “World of Warplanes.”

It is hard to get a good fix on Wargaming. In one statement it hints at 60 million users. Its site also mentions 150 million gamers, but it is hard to tell whether this is Wargaming’s player universe or some larger one.

Wargaming is not just in the free game business. It also creates games for Xbox and PS4. According to its website:

Wargaming – one of the leading free-to-play MMO. We have behind him more than 18 years in the game industry and more than 15 games for various platforms.

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As of 2015, according to the Cyprus Mail:

Hellenic Bank CEO, Bert Pijls is aware of the challenge ahead and determined to grow market share from third largest Cyprus bank to first (not difficult given the outstanding NPL’s of the other two) …

And Hellenic can do just that with investors like Wargaming Public Co Ltd, which is an international MMO (massively multiplayer online) developer and publisher, headquartered in Nicosia, now operating across 16 offices and development centres worldwide to become one of the leaders in the market.

Wargaming is the biggest tax payer in Cyprus, with a workforce numbering hundreds, and many more in Belarus developing new games.

The construction of a half pyramidal shaped tower block situated opposite their head office on Severis Avenue, Nicosia is nearing completion, as is that of PricewaterhouseCooper’s new Nicosia HQ two doors along and facing Government House.

Something tells me Cyprus is onto something good.

Wargaming is a major shareholder in Hellenic Bank with two Wargamers working at the bank’s head office rumoured to be buying up any viable Cyprus asset (land on beach, etc.) as the company earns millions of euros from their tank games to invest ahead of when their games are replaced.

At one point in 2014, the Cypress Stock Exchange suspended trading in the shares of Wargaming because it had not filed proper 2013 financials.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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