Rovio Entertainment announced the creation of Kaiken Publishing, a new affiliate company that will continue and build on Rovio’s book business while also developing publishing programs for new stories, worlds and characters.
Rovio is well known for Angry Birds which has been downloaded more than 2 billion times. The unusual move towards books publishing is the company's latest effort to reinvigorate its business. The success of Angry Birds had skyrocketed Rovio profits between 2009 and 2012 before it hit a snag. Since then, Rovio's profits fell by 50% in 2013 before shedding another 73% in 2014. The company laid off 370 employees in those 2 years alone.
Kaiken will concentrate on children’s and teen content as well as comics for all ages, and work as the global master licensee of Rovio’s brands with a strong focus on Angry Birds. At the same time, the company will develop new storyworlds in the spirit of Storm Sisters and Freya, Rovio’s acclaimed young adult titles, while also creating publishing programs for other licensors.
Rovio’s books operations began in 2011 with The Bad Piggies Egg Recipes cookbook, which went on to win the Gourmand Award for the Best First Cookbook in the World in 2012. Since then, the team has worked on creating and licensing hundreds of books in 35 languages and more than 50 countries. The Angry Birds Movie program has many renowned partners on board, and Imprint, a part of Macmillan Children’s Publishing Group, acquired worldwide English rights for the first two Freya novels in 2015. The rights to the Storm Sisters series have been sold in eight languages.