King (company)

King is a Swedish video game company that makes and publishes social games. It became widely known after launching *Candy Crush Saga* in 2012, a game that works across different devices and is considered one of the most profitable examples of the freemium business model. The company has its main offices in Stockholm and London, is legally registered in St. Julian's, Malta, and has been part of Activision Blizzard as one of its three publishing units since 2016. When Microsoft bought Activision Blizzard in October 2023, King continued to operate as part of Activision Blizzard within Microsoft's Gaming division.

The company was founded by Riccardo Zacconi and Toby Rowland, who had previously worked together on the dating site uDate.com. That site, created by Melvyn Morris, was sold to Match.com in 2003 for $150 million. Zacconi and Rowland then teamed up with Thomas Hartwig, Sebastian Knutsson, Lars Markgren, and Patrik Stymne—all former colleagues from the failed web portal Spray—to start a new venture, backed by angel investment from Morris, who became chairman. Originally based in Stockholm, the company began making browser-based games and launched its site, Midasplayer.com, in August 2003.

Midasplayer.com struggled to turn a profit and nearly went under until Morris provided emergency funding on Christmas Eve 2003. By 2005, the company was profitable and raised $43 million by selling a large stake to Apax Partners and Index Ventures—its last investment before going public in 2014. The site was rebranded as King.com in November 2005. King continued developing games for its own portal and sharing them with other sites like Yahoo!, eventually creating about 200 games. By 2009, annual revenue reached around $60 million. Rowland left in 2008 to start an educational math games site, Mangahigh, selling his stake back to King for $3 million in 2011; angel investor Klaus Hommels sold his stake at the same time.

Around 2009, the rise of social network games on Facebook, led by Zynga, caused a sharp drop in players on King’s portal. In response, King began developing Facebook versions of its existing games, releasing its first in 2010. The company used its web portal to test new ideas and decide which to bring to Facebook, also figuring out how to add microtransactions for tournament-style play.