Paytm acquires Tiger Global-backed Cube26 in fire sale

Delhi-based Cube26 had raised a mind-boggling - Rs 50 crore in seed funding from Tiger Global and Flipkart; but then faded away. Recently, however, it has been acquired by payments major Paytm.

Cube26 is now a part of the Alibaba-backed acquisition portfolio that also counts NearBuy, Little, and TicketNew.

While the quantum of the deal remained undisclosed, the deal must have been a fire sale because Cube26 had been struggling for a while to find new products and investors.

The six-year-old company had been in stealth mode for over a year and a half.

From the beginning of this year, Cube26 had been making efforts to work in short video social space (as per an interaction between Entrackr and Cube26 six months ago).

According to Paytm, the acquisition will help them to enhance the UI/UX over the mobile platform for gaming. Besides, both team will work to further social engagement features on Paytm’s products and services, reports Mint.

The acquisition comes against the backdrop of Paytm's announcement of upgrading its in-app messaging feature 'Inbox' with the addition of gaming, live tv, among others.

Meanwhile, Paytm has been working on gaming products for quite some time. It formed a partnership with China's lottery firm AGTech Media to launch Gamepind - a mobile gaming platform with social and casual games with include rewards.

The six-year-old Cube26 came into light when they raised a whopping seed-fund from Tiger and Flipkart in 2015. Since then, the company had tried many things including customised Android platforms for OEMs such as Micromax, Karbonn, and Intex.

It also explored consumer IoT segment, however, both attempts failed to figure out the right business model.

Founded by Saurav Kumar, Abhilekh Agarwal, and Aakash Jain, the firm had around 140 employees in August 2016 but later, it reduced the team size to around 10-12 people.

Cube26 had shut down its Internet of Things (IoT) business, which was the reason for the exodus.

We are unable to access the Cube26 website, but reportedly it is building a games and apps store by connecting local developers directly with smartphone users. The app store will also enable developers to monetise their content.