Supercell’s chief wants every game to be as good as Clash of Clans (interview part one)

Disclosure: The organizers of Slush paid my way to Helsinki. Our coverage remains objective. This is part one of a two-part interview. Part two runs Tuesday. 

HELSINKI — Ilkka Paananen and most of his 130 employees at Supercell, the maker of the incredibly successful Clash of Clans mobile strategy game, are rich enough to retire. They just sold 51 percent of their Helsinki-based company to Japan’s SoftBank and GungHo Entertainment (the makers of the popular and lucrative Puzzles & Dragons puzzle-role-playing game) for $1.53 billion. That makes Supercell worth about $3 billion, or more than Zynga, the social gaming giant with 2,200 employees.