Grand Games, a mobile gaming company based in Istanbul developing social games, has scored $30 million in Series A funding. Balderton Capital (which recently backed Tilt and Checkly) led the round with participation from existing investors Bek Ventures (formerly known as Earlybird Digital East), Laton Ventures and angel investor Mert Gür.
This round marks one of the largest Series A funding secured by a Turkish startup. This follows the $3 million funding raised last year.
What’s next for the gaming startup?
Grand Games will use the funds to accelerate its rapid growth, scale into global markets including the US and launch a new flagship genre-defining game in 2025, on its mission to become an entertainment powerhouse. The team expects to grow from 14 to more than 40 this year, hiring across game design, coding, art, music and business development. The company also plans to open new studios in Istanbul.
Develops original game ideas
Grand Games was founded by Mustafa Fırtına, Mehmet Çalım and Bekir Batuhan Çelebi in 2024. They have held leading roles in the development of successful games such as Zen Match and Wonder Blast at companies like Good Job Games and Moon Active.
The company uses AI to build up to 30% of each game’s codebase, and uses platforms like Midjourney to generate the art concepts for its products, reducing the time it takes to create and publish titles and allowing them to build, test, and iterate faster than their competitors.
In under 10 months, Grand’s team has built two of mobile game’s most popular titles, Magic Sort and Car Match. Together the games have exceeded $4m of monthly gross In App Revenue in just three months.
What sets it apart from competition?
Even though mobile gaming grows in size each year, the quality bar for games has risen significantly over the years and the number of successful games published has decreased each year.
The startup has a strategy that differentiates it from other studios. Instead of building clones of existing games, Grand is laser-focused on creating original, genre-defining hits.
Bekir Batuhan Çelebi, co-founder of Grand Games, said: “We are recruiting the best of the best and we give those teams unparalleled ownership and accountability – you build your game your way. Great games are built by world-class creative talents being free to express themselves. As gamers ourselves we were increasingly disappointed with minor low product differentiation of new games available. At Grand we’re focusing on meeting the underserved needs of gamers by creating genre defining games with major product differentiation.
Suranga Chandratillake, General Partner at Balderton Capital, said: “Istanbul is producing some of the world’s finest gaming studios and within that ecosystem the founders of Grand Games stood out with their vision to create world-class genre-defining casual games that players love to play. The speed with which they have built a brilliant team culture and achieved success with their first two games demonstrates their talent and commitment. We are excited to be working with a team with sky-high ambition and passion for gaming.”
Oguzhan Ozer, Principal at Bek Ventures, said: “We have maintained a highly selective approach to investing in Turkey’s thriving gaming ecosystem, despite its remarkable strengths, and Grand Games was our first gaming investment since Peak Games. The Grand team convinced us they had the exceptional talent and bold vision to build an enduring company, and since backing them at pre-seed, they have proven their ability to execute beyond a doubt, producing multiple, highly successful premium titles simultaneously. It is a pleasure to continue to support them in their journey.”
Görkem Türk, Founder at Laton Ventures, said: “We are very happy with the success of Grand Games, one of our first investments. With their early traction and solid team culture, we believe they are on their path to become Turkey’s next unicorn.”
