Mobile developer Space Ape Games recently launched a spinoff team called NextBeat, reports PocketGamer. Several Space Ape employees are transferring to the new studio, including co-founder Simon Hade as its CEO and product manager George Yao as head of live games.
Per MobileGamer, 30 staffers currently make up NextBeat. Several non-Space Ape developers have joined, such as CFO (and Kepler Interactive veteran) Joe Adams.
NextBeat’s emergence comes as Space Ape is set to be fully acquired by Supercell by the spring. The Clash of Clans maker previously invested stake into the London developer, which makes BeatStar and Transformers: Earth Wars for phones.
NextBeat is taking BeatStar on tour
According to PocketGamer, the BeatStar and Country Star properties are also jumping over to NextBeat. Hade and co-founder Olly Barnes told Music Business Worldwide the former game has over 100 million downloads worldwide and is projected to exceed $200 million in lifetime revenue before the end of 2025. As such, Hade said they had to “address this immense opportunity, now.”
“BeatStar taught us that there is huge per-user monetization potential for music in gaming,” said Barnes. “The vast mobile gaming audience and ARPU insights from Country Star’s genre-focused approach underscored the need to launch a fully resourced company dedicated to this opportunity.”
As Hade told Music Business, NextBeat is considered more of a “dedicated, music-focused venture” than a mobile game developer like Space Ape. His ultimate hope is for the new studio to “expand into more experiences, games and apps that showcase the inspiration and creativity of our artist partners.” Such plans, according to the outlet, potentially include entering the educational tech and mental health sectors.
For now, the focus is on growing out BeatStar into other genres via potential standalone games. Barnes told MobileGamer the next “most obvious evolution” would be nostalgic rock, a la Guitar Hero. Hade showed similar interest in Latin, anime music, and EDM, but said some genres might require “slightly different” monetization approaches.