NEW YORK, Oct. 25, 2006 (PRIMEZONE) -- Mind Candy, the UK based company behind the Alternate Reality Game (ARG) Perplex City, announced today it has raised $7 million from Accel Partners and existing investors Index Ventures and NewMedia Spark. The funding comes in advance of a major expansion of new products to be announced in early 2007 including the development of its second major puzzle brand aimed at a younger demographic.
An ARG is a form of mystery or treasure hunt that blends real world events, websites, text messages, TV, print and a wide range of other media to create an immersive gaming experience.
Mind Candy's signature game, Perplex City, revolves around the search for a missing treasure with a $200,000 (100,000 Pounds) reward. The game has proved most popular with 16 to 30-year-olds and currently has tens of thousands of players from 92 different countries around the world. The players are in the final stages of piecing together the clues to the game that have been hidden across a wide variety of different media.
The second season of the game will be launching in early 2007 and there are currently a wide-range of new Perplex City products in development including books, video games and mobile content.
Michael Acton Smith, CEO of Mind Candy, said, "Our first game, Perplex City, has generated several million dollars in revenue and tapped into the rapidly growing popularity of both puzzles and Alternate Reality Games. Now we plan to take that to a new level by evolving our products to appeal to a larger, more mainstream audience."
Bruce Golden, General Partner at Accel Partners said, "We believe that Mind Candy is a pioneer in developing new forms of entertainment that combine some of the best attributes of the internet with the strengths of traditional board games, puzzles, and treasure hunts. Mind Candy's initial success at establishing a passionate community of participants in Perplex City, combined with their ambitious plans to build a global brand for consumers interested in this new form of entertainment represents a very exciting investment opportunity for us. We look forward to working with Michael and his team to help fulfill their potential to create a significant new media company."
About Mind Candy
Mind Candy Incorporated (www.mindcandydesign.com) is the creator of Perplex City (www.perplexcity.com). The company, based in London, is Europe's leading developer of Alternate Reality Games. Mind Candy was founded in 2003 by Michael Acton Smith who previously co-founded online retailer Firebox.com in 1998. Original backers of Mind Candy include Tom Teichman, NewMedia Spark, John Hegarty, Saul Klein and Robin Klein.
About Accel Partners
Founded in 1983, Accel Partners is one of the world's leading venture capital firms. The firm is dedicated to partnering with outstanding entrepreneurs to build world-class Internet, software and networking companies. Representative current and former investments include Brightcove, Comscore, Double Fusion, Facebook, Glam, Macromedia, RealNetworks, and The Cloud. For more information, please visit www.Accel.com.
About Index Ventures
Index Ventures is a leading European venture capital firm active in technology venture investing since 1996. The firm is dedicated to helping top entrepreneurial teams in the Information Technology and Life Science sectors build their companies into market defining global leaders. Investments include Betfair, Skype, MySQL (the world's most popular open source database), Photoways and Lovefilm. For more information, please visit www.indexventures.com.