Mobile and online games predicted to be 60% of the market by 2017

A new report from investment bank Digi-Capital predicts that mobile and online games will continue to rapidly expand and flourish, especially in Asian and European markets, accounting for an expected $60 billion in revenue by 2017. That's expected to push revenue for the entire games industry past $100 billion by 2017, at which point mobile and online games are predicted to account for roughly 60 percent of the global market for game software. Europe and especially Asia proved to be hotbeds of growth for the emerging market, accounting for 80 percent of the global revenue from online and mobile games in 2013. Asian companies like Tencent and SoftBank paid for nine of the top ten most valuable mergers and acquisitions in the games industry last year. Digi-Capital claims those deals helped drive the total value of mergers & acquisitions in the game market to a record high of over $5.6 billion in 2013. The report, an excerpted version of Digi-Capital's Global Games Investment Review 2014, also notes that video game investments continue to grow, though investors focus primarily on mobile games and gamification technology -- the average game industry investment deal grew to $6 million, roughly 15 percent more than the average deal in 2012. Digi-Capital is an investment bank that specializes in games, media and technology across Asia, Europe and North America. You can read an executive summary of the company's most recent Global Games Investment Review on its website.