We visited the company GameDuell. They create multiplayer games.
Here is the interview with Axel Schmidt, Head of Communications at GameDuell.
The interview took place in August 2016, the pictures were taken in January 2013.
Please tell us something about your Company, when was your company founded, your location, in how many countries are you active:
GameDuell was founded in 2003 and went live with its games platform www.gameduell.de and its first web games in spring time 2004. Meanwhile the company offers around 70 games mostly developed in-house.
They are directly playable in the browser without any installation.
Since 2009 the company has strongly expanded to social and mobile platforms offering many of its most successful games on Facebook as well as on iOS and Android smartphones and tablets.
From its head office near Gendarmenmarkt in Berlin-Mitte GameDuell caters to an audience of millions of players.
Your Business
What is your core business?
GameDuell offers community games for web, Facebook and mobile. Our vision is bringing people together to have a good time with games.
That’s why our games always have a social and competitive multiplayer aspect to them.
How did you get to your business idea and when was your company established?
We always loved this aspect of the Internet to connect people independent of their physical location. Back in 2003 our core idea of GameDuell was to bring people together to compete in casual games on the Internet and to offer them a central community and tournament platform.
The accessibility of web games without complicated hardware and installation also opened up the possibility to bring games to people who didn’t play digital games before. Now with mobile, this idea is more relevant than ever before.
Are you using Venture Capital? And if – who are your Venture Partners?
In 2003 we started out and were happy to find great investors with Holtzbrinck Ventures, Acton Capital Partners (Burda Digital Ventures) and Wellington Partners.
In which countries are you active? Are you planning to expand your venture in other countries? And if yes – where?
Our core markets are Western and Central Europe and North America. With our mobile and social games we cater to a global audience and also welcome players from more exotic countries and markets like South America, China, India, the Philippines and Oceania.
Where do you see the company in 5 years?
Today GameDuell is one of the global market leaders in competitive multiplayer card and board games. We strive to expand this position further by adding more popular games of this kind to our portfolio, by conquering new markets and expanding the features of our games platform further.
Our latest game is Grand Gin Rummy for a North American mass audience. Due to its superb overall quality it was featured globally by Apple and Facebook right from the start.
We will continue to build games of this high quality level and integrate them into our competitive games platform. For us the future is always in the development of a great community.
Your Team
How many employees work at your company right now? Are you planning to expand?
At GameDuell we have around 150 team members from 30 different countries. We believe in quality and therefore foster high performance teams.
We will expand selectively as we are developing more games but will always focus on quality rather than quantity.
What is the average age of your team members?
We have a healthy mixture of young team members and internationally experienced professionals. The average age is around 34.
What kind of attitude should new employees have in order to work at your company?
At GameDuell we focus on a superior customer experience. Thus, GameDuell team members should bring the ambition for excellence in all aspects of their work. They should have a passion for games and contribute to a positive team spirit. We are not only a games company, but we are a technology company.
That’s why we expect team members to think smart and lean, act flexible and actively strive for innovation.
Why is it fun to work at your company? Do you offer any employee benefits?
We actively share knowledge and experience at GameDuell in regular product reviews, communities of practice, trainings and workshops. We want to learn and get better every day.
GameDuell embraces a 21st century approach to work.
Team members are very flexible where and how to fulfill their job as long as it gets done. We offer a lot of freedom and expect team members to work self-reliantly on their area of responsibility, but actively share their results and contribute to the team effort.
All teams of GameDuell are organized with an agile project management approach – including the management. To relax from work and get together we offer free gymnastics and yoga courses, beach volleyball hours, cooking and game evenings, regular team parties and barbecues on our rooftop terrace.
Do you offer new employees a relocation service or help to relocate?
Sure, our HR team supports team members in all aspects of relocation, from visas and work permits to finding a place to live and relocation.
Do you have a job board?
Our open positions are always available here.
Your Office
How big is your Office/Production Site?
Our headquarters is located in the former Berlin office of the leading German TV station SAT1. It stretches over 2,350 square meters ( 25,300 square foot) and two extensive floors.
The heart of our office is the fabulous GameDuell lounge, our assembly hall with an open kitchen where we stage many internal and external events like the GameDuell TechTalk with internationally renowned experts in digital technologies. Check out www.techtalk-berlin.de.
Did you get help from an interior designer by designing the office? And if who did you work together with?
Before we moved in, our office was renovated as a huge open space with transparent glass walls and sound proof ceilings. Our walls and meeting rooms are decorated with hand-painted game characters and we still invest a lot of effort and love to design individually themed office spaces.
Everybody is welcome to visit us and check it out.
Thank you GameDuell Team for this interview & the photoshooting!
Location: Berlin, Germany Website: www.gameduell.com Photos: copyright by Andreas Lukoschek
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