TECNALIA revolutionises the gaming industry with WiMi5

• It is a new technology-based company created within TECNALIA, with the investments of IT Net Group, Microwave, Emprendiza, Civea Investment and the entrepreneur Jesús Ángel Bravo.

TECNALIA has decided to invest in the gaming industry with the creation of WiMi5 It is a new technology-based company directed by Raúl Otaolea and formed by a team of five more professionals from TECNALIA, all with an extensive history in the gaming industry. With the creation of this spin-off, the entire team has become part of this new company.

TECNALIA was the perfect environment for the development of this new business opportunity.

WiMi5 has just ended its first financing round, in which it has been valued at 1.6 million Euros and has obtained 390,000 Euros in external funds. The operation has been backed up by IT Net Group, the investment structure of the Catalonian entrepreneurial holding directed by Carlos Blanco, one of the largest investors in the Internet and gaming world; the Madrid-based fund Civeta Investment, specialised in technological start-ups; and a group of Basque investors comprised by Seed Funds that are specialised and greatly experienced in the field of digital businesses and software, such as MicroWave Ventures, Emprendiza and a group of Business Angels, led by Jesús Ángel Bravo.

TECNALIA’s main task has been to expedite the incubation prior to the creation of the company through TECNALIA Ventures, facilitating that the investors and the managing team become the driving force of the project now, with the incentive of a progressive shares acquisition scheme.

WiMi5 is the first company in this sector to provide a cloud-based platform to create, publish and market casual and social games.

It is noteworthy that WiMi5’s direct competition is located in Silicon Valley, where the most state-of-the-art videogames and technologies are developed.

The tool is free for developers and works through a modern browser thanks to HTML5 and cloud computing, so it does not require the installation of any additional software, in contrast with other similar game creation tools.

How WiMi5 works

One of the great differentiating features of WiMi5 is that its games work on any device: PCs, mobile phones and tablets. This has been one of the historical problems that the software and programming world have stumbled across, and WiMi5 overcomes it.

The WiMi5 business model focuses on microtransactions. “We start charging money once the developer starts to earn money with their game”, explained Raúl Otaolea. For this purpose, the WiMi5 team assists and encourages the users of their platform to create free2play games. These games are initially free, but they support micro-sales so players can obtain “a faster car or an improvement in their fighting game”, Otaolea mentions as examples. “The developer keeps 70% of each microtransaction and we earn 30%.”

WiMi5 operates globally, as Internet-based companies do. Its headquarters will be located in Bilbao.