Zynga(ˈzɪŋɡə)is a provider of social game services founded in July 2007 and headquartered in San Francisco,California.The company develops social games that work stand-alone on mobile phone platforms such as Apple iOS and Android and on the Internet through its website,Zynga.com,and social networking websites such as Facebook,Google+,and Tencent.Zynga states its mission as Connecting the world through games.The company was named in honor of Zinga,CEO Mark Pincus’s late American bulldog.

Zynga launched what is considered its best-known game,FarmVille,on Facebook in June 2009,reaching 10 million daily active users(DAU)within six weeks.As of early January 2013,Zynga games had over 265 million monthly active users(MAU),and three of the top five Facebook games(in terms of MAU,according to AppData)were Zynga titles FarmVille 2,Texas HoldEm Poker(now known as Zynga Poker),and ChefVille.Figures suggest 80 percent of Zynga's revenue comes from Facebook users,but its current relationship with Facebook ended March 31,2013.

Zynga began trading on NASDAQ December 16,2011 under the ticker ZNGA.Originally priced at$10,ZNGA shares reached a price of$14.50 in March 2012,but fell steadily after that point,hitting$2.09 in 2012.ome analysts and journalists have questioned the long-term prospects of Zynga’s business model,especially after Zynga’s Q2 2012 earnings report failed to meet analyst projections for revenue and earnings.Zynga has been taking steps to cut expenses and expand its business into areas such as licensed board games,online gambling,its own gaming platform(Zynga.com),and mobile game apps.

Mark Pincus founded Zynga in April 2007 under the name Presidio Media;the company name changed to Zynga in July 2007.Zynga was named after an American bulldog named Zinga once owned by Mark Pincus.The company uses an image of a bulldog as its logo.The early supporting founding team included Eric Schiermeyer,Michael Luxton,Justin Waldron,Kyle Stewart,Scott Dale,Steve Schoettler,and Andrew Trader.

Zynga's first game,Texas Hold'Em Poker,now known as Zynga Poker,was released on Facebook in July 2007.

The company received US$10 million,led by venture capital firm Union Square Ventures,in its first round of funding in January 2008.In July of the same year,Zynga received US$29 million in venture finance from several firms,led by Kleiner Perkins Caufield&Byers in July 2008,at which time they appointed former Electronic Arts Chief Creative Officer Bing Gordon to the board.During the same period,they also bought YoVille,a large virtual world social network game.

Zynga became the#1 Facebook app developer with 40 million monthly active users(MAU)in April 2009.Soon after,the company opened its first external game studio in Baltimore,Zynga East,led by noted game maker and now Chief Game Designer Brian Reynolds.In June of the same year,Zynga launched FarmVille on Facebook and by August it was the first game on Facebook to reach 10 million daily active users.It had 20 million daily active users by October.On November 23,2009,FarmVille.com went live as Zynga’s first stand-alone game.

In February 2010,Zynga acquired Serious Business,a social game company.Zynga also in February opened a studio in Los Angeles,California as well as Zynga India in Bangalore,the company’s first office outside the United States.
TechCrunch's Michael Arrington reported on May 7,2010,that Zynga was threatening to leave Facebook altogether in the wake of Facebook's requiring exclusive use of Facebook Credits for monetization in applications.On May 18,2010,Facebook and Zynga entered into a five-year relationship to expand the use of Facebook Credits in Zynga's games.

In May 2010,Zynga acquired XPD Media.Weeks later on June 3,2010,Zynga acquired Challenge Games,which would later be known as Zynga Austin.On June 9,2010 Zynga launched FrontierVille developed at its Zynga East studio in Baltimore.

Zynga acquired Conduit Labs in August 17,2010,renaming it Zynga Boston.The acquisition of Dextrose,now Zynga Germany,marked the company's first expansion into Europe.

Bonfire Studios was acquired by Zynga on October 5,2010.It was renamed Zynga Dallas.The acquisition brought Zynga's workforce to more than 1300 employees worldwide.Months later,on December 2,2010,Zynga announced it acquired the Texas-based mobile game developer Newtoy,Inc.,developers of Words with Friends and Chess with Friends,and renamed the studio to Zynga With Friends.

In December 2010,Zynga's game CityVille surpassed FarmVille as its most popular game with over 61 million monthly active users and a base of over 16 million daily active users.

Zynga acquired the New York-based game developer AreaCode,now renamed Zynga New York in January 2011.Soon after,in March 2011,Zynga announced the acquisition of the team from Boston-based game developer,Floodgate Entertainment.It was Zynga's tenth acquisition in ten months.In April 2011,Zynga announced the acquisition of MarketZero,an online poker tracker company.

In May 2011,the company launched its most complicated game to date—Empires and Allies.

Zynga filed with the SEC to raise up to$1 billion in an initial public offering on July 1,2011.At the time,the company had 2,000 employees.Zynga began trading on NASDAQ on December 16,2011.

On January 8,2012,Zynga added a new category to its social gaming with a new puzzle game,Hidden Chronicles.

February 15,2012,saw the launch of Zynga Slingo,a version of the popular slotsbingo combination games popular online and in casinos.

On March 21,2012,Zynga announced they purchased the game company OMGPOP for$180 million,therein acquiring the game Draw Something.A noticeable drop in popularity was noted following the acquisition,as daily active users dropped from 15 million to 10 million in the first month post-acquisition.In June 2012,CBS was the winner of a bidding war for the pilot of a TV Gameshow based on Draw Something.

On June 4,2012,Zynga announced the purchase of video game maker Buzz Monkey,along with their entire 50 person,Oregon based office,which will now turn into Zynga's 18th satellite office.Buzz Monkey is known for working on successful video games such as Tomb Raider and Tony Hawk,as well as Zynga's Frontierville.

On June 26,2012,during the annual Zynga Unleashed conference,Zynga announced the Zynga With Friends network.The goal is to connect players of various Zynga game titles across multiple platforms including Facebook,iOS,Android,Windows Phone,and Zynga.com.Players create profiles to show off their activity,message friends,discover which games friends are playing,and meet new people based on shared gaming interests.

During the 2012 Unleashed conference,Zynga also announced the Zynga API,which will help developers build social games.The company announced that three new partners were developing games for Zynga.com including 50 Cubes,Majesco Entertainment and Portalarium and unveiled the Zynga Partners for Mobile program to help increase Zynga’s presence on mobile devices.Zynga Partners for Mobile include Atari(Super Bunny Breakout),Crash Lab(Twist Pilot),Fat Pebble(Clay Jam),Phosphor Games Studio(Horn),Sava Transmedia(Rubber Tacos),and Digital Legends Entertainment(The Respawnables).

On October 14,2012,Zynga filed a lawsuit against a former general manager for allegedly misappropriating trade secrets.The suit claims the ex-employee copied important confidential information from his computer before leaving Zynga to work for a rival social games maker.

On November 9,2012,Zynga announced it had acquired game company November Software for an undisclosed amount.Zynga revealed that the acquisition actually happened back in the spring and that it will be working on bringing console gaming experiences to mobile.The rumored title of the game is Battlestone.
On February 5,2013,Mark Pincus,CEO and Founder,announced that the biggest highlight of the quarter was seeing our team deliver a successful sequel in FarmVille2,a next generation social game that offers cutting edge 3-D experiences loved by millions of FarmVille fans,”In 2013,Zynga will bring this new class of social games to mobile phones and tablets and build a network that offers an easier,better way for people to play together.

Revenue
According to the company’s first-ever earnings report,revenues from advertising and the sale of virtual goods grew by 59 percent compared with the same period the prior year.A net loss of$435 million included a one-time$510 million employee stock compensation expense that was triggered by the company going public.

The company's top three games–FarmVille,FrontierVille and CityVille–accounted for 57 percent of online game revenue.Total revenue was$329 million for the quarter ending March 31,2012.

Zynga approached a billion dollars in revenue in four years since inception,surpassing the market value of the longtime console game company Electronic Arts.Zynga's rapid growth has been seen as an indicator of the vastly different playing field from only a few years before,where games have become able to gain significant public acceptance in a shorter period of time,with the cost of entry being much lower.

On July 25th 2012,Zynga reported revenue of$332 million for its Q2 2012,which was up 19 percent year over year,and reported that Q2 bookings increased 10 percent year over year.However,the company also reported a net income loss of$22.8 million,and reduced forecast for bookings for 2012 from 1.47 billion to 1.15 billion.Following Zynga’s weak Q2 2012 earnings,Zynga’s stock dropped by 40 percent in after hours trading,and analysts heavily criticized Zynga,with Richard Greenfield of BTIG taking the rare step of apologizing for having recommended the stock.Zynga executives listed several reasons for the Q2 earnings changes to Facebook's gaming platform that hindered Zynga users;a delayed release for an important new game;and several new games that didn’t meet expectations.

In late October 2012,Zynga's stock price increased as much as 16 percent after it had posted revenues of$317 million during its third quarter,beating estimates of$256 million.Its revenue boost and stock price jump was a result of Zynga's$200 million share buyback plan that the company decided to instill to help improve its recent stock price declines.Another factor included Zynga's announcement that it was moving into real-money gambling in the U.K.While acknowledging Zynga’s continuing challenges such as slowing sales and its low stock price,some analysts were more upbeat after the Q3 2012 earnings than they had been after Q2 2012 earnings were announced.“Every single thing that they are doing is what you would want them to do,”said Michael Pachter,an analyst with Wedbush Securities Inc.Comparing Q2 to Q3 earnings conference calls,journalists noted a change in CEO Pincus’tone.“Instead of blaming an uncertain economy,wandering consumer tastes or a weird alignment between Jupiter and Mars,the CEO's message to Wall Street was clear Blame us,”wrote CNET.

In early 2013,Zynga CEO Mark Pincus announced that FarmVille,one of Zynga's most popular games,had reached$1 billion in total player bookings.

Zynga is supported in two manners via direct credit card payments and partner businesses.Several Zynga games require an Energy characteristic to play.Engaging in Missions,a core feature of many games,consumes a certain amount of energy.After expending energy,it slowly replenishes to the character's maximum limit.This can take minutes or several hours(energy replenishes whether or not players are logged into the game).

After energy is replenished,players can engage in additional missions.Waiting for energy to replenish is a significant limiting factor in the games.Their support mechanisms take advantage of this.Zynga games are linked to offers from a number of partners.Players can accept credit card offers,take surveys or buy services from Zynga's partners in order to obtain game credits,which would allow them to replenish their character's energy or receive premium currency that could be exchanged for other various virtual goods.Players may also purchase game credits directly from Zynga via credit cards or PayPal.From within the game,players can purchase the points for a fee US$5.00 for 21 game credits,for example.In March 2010 Zynga started selling prepaid cards for virtual currency at more than 12,800 stores across the US.

Zynga also sells advertising sponsorships within some games such as movie tie-ins and other brands.In March,2012,Zynga announced it launched a separate social gaming platform,which will include publishing other developers to the new Zynga.com platform.Early third-party developers include Row Sham Bow,Inc and Mobscience.In June,2012 Zynga started running Facebook advertisements and sponsored stories on its website.The revenue is to be split between Facebook and Zynga,as they continue their partnership.The exact percentage of this split has yet to be disclosed.