Social gaming company WinZO on Monday said  it expects its ecosystem to create more than 1 lakh direct and indirect jobs over the next one year, as first reported by Economic Times.

Winzo co-founder Saumya Singh Rathore told PTI that with growth in the number of games, the company is engaging housewives, teachers and influencers for various assignments paid on a work basis and the number is expected to grow in coming years.

Rathore said the company engages 1 lakh influencers who are earning Rs 75,000 to Rs 1 lakh on an average per month. Two years ago the number was 25,000 micro influencers earning between 30,000-40,000 on monthly basis. 'We expect the numbers to double, that is to become 2 lakh within the next one year and their payout is also expected to increase 2-2.5 times,' Rathore said.

She said that some of the influencers who grew with WinZO now garnered over 10 lakh subscribers earn anywhere between Rs 5 lakh and Rs 10 lakh a month.

"Two years ago WinZO was engaging with 300-400 translators. The number has now grown to be 7,000 translators across the country with Winzo adding 5 more languages and taking the number of languages to 12. We are expecting the number of translators to go up by at least 1.5 to 2 times in the next year or so. The translators earn Rs 35,000-50,000 on an average every month," Rathore said.

WinZO which recently filed a case against Google for discriminatory policies has exited from Google's Play Store and now provides its own platform where third-party game developers host their games. The platform charges commission from gaming entities in single-digit percentages.

A spree of Court cases

WinZO recently lost a trademark injunction suit filed by Baazi Games on the usage of the word Baazi.  

WinZO had sued Head Digital Works Private Limited, the operator of the rummy portal A23, social gaming platform Witty Games for a trademark before the Delhi High Court. The suit is filed by WinZo seeking a permanent and mandatory injunction restraining Head Digital from infringement of trademarks, passing off, etc.

In another case, WinZO challenged the constitutional validity of the Odisha Prevention of Gambling Act, 1955. The law prohibits all forms of gaming for stakes. 

Funding:

Having raised $65 million in a Series C funding round in September 2021, the gaming company is on a partnership spree. A few weeks earlier, WinZo announced a partnership with Asphalt developer Gameloft. 

The gaming company also partnered with Kalaari Capital to launch an investment initiative Gaming Lab to encourage and support the gaming ecosystem in the country. The Gaming Lab will invest up to $1 million in each of the investee companies across all forms of interactive apps in India. In September 2021, the company launched a standalone game developer fund with a corpus of $20 million.