GameMine says it is making money with its subscription mobile games

The odds are good that you haven’t heard of GameMine, which offers a catalog of 400 mobile games for a subscription fee. But the Los Angeles company says it has accomplished something that many mobile-game companies never do. It is profitable, and at its current rate of making money, it could generate more than $20 million in profits before the end of 2018.

Of course, a lot of things could change. But the subscription model has brought a measure of predictability and stability to the company’s finances.

GameMine raised $20 million in funding in May 2017 in order to expand internationally. It has deals with brands, such as Nickelodeon to create Nickelodeon-themed games, and it has distribution partnerships with mobile carriers that include Vodacom, Orange, and Telefonica.

“The impressive growth of GameMine’s mobile-game library in 2017 allowed us to secure several new international distribution partnerships as well as significantly expand our existing partnerships with a range of European and African mobile carriers,“ said GameMine CEO Daniel Starr in a statement. “We have also partnered with Nickelodeon to offer subscribers a range of mobile games featuring globally recognized characters like SpongeBob SquarePants and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The diversity of our game library plus these partnerships’ expansion of territories where GameMine is available effectively skyrocketed our subscriber base, which pushed us solidly into profitability, so much so that we’re on track to do more than $20 million in profits before the end of 2018.”

GameMine operates a multinational mobile-game publishing company that develops, licenses, and acquires mobile games, then provides them to consumers in more than 135 countries through a marketplace. The company added millions of installs and more than 300 mobile games in 2017 alone. Starr and Flaviu Rus, GameMine’s president, founded the enterprise.

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat at VentureBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.