The fortunes of its founders, who together own a 96% stake in Playrix, have more than doubled since 2020.

Playrix brought in over $2.9 billion in revenues in 2021 and boasts about 110 million monthly average users, 25 million of whom are in the U.S., the company told Forbes. 2 biggest mobile game developer in the world (measured by revenue) after China’s Tencent in 2020, according to researcher AppAnnie. “I just don’t want to work with these people anymore,” he told Forbes from Kharkiv, where he is still living.įounded in Vologda, Russia, in 2004, Playrix saw its business balloon during the Covid-19 pandemic–jumping from the No. The producer, who had been working at Playrix for just four months before the war started, said he decided to resign over the incident and Playrix’s general handling of the war in Ukraine. The Russian government has said that any financial, informational or other material help to Ukraine from a Russian citizen will be considered treason and result in prison time.īut five Ukrainian employees interviewed by Forbes and Forbes Ukraine say Playrix’s actions have made them feel censored and left behind. Playrix, and its billionaire founders, are in a precarious situation. He confirmed that Playrix went on to shutter these channels altogether, a decision he said was caused by increasingly frequent “outbursts of uncontrolled hatred between employees.” “That is why we have temporarily archived several channels and kept open only those intended for communication about work and supporting our colleagues in Ukraine,” Bukhman said.

“The only thing we’re asking of our employees during this crisis is that they keep our few official work channels solely for business communication.” “We have never censored and will never censor the expressions of opinions or the creation of any channels to discuss these opinions,” Bukhman told Forbes. Igor Bukhman, who moved from Israel to London with his brother two years ago (they hold both Russian and Israeli citizenship), said Playrix purging certain messages from the Slack channels was not political.

Playrix homescapes help