ShurickAgapitov: Providing the "Best Solution" for Chinese Game Developers to Dig Gold Abroad

The value of an entrepreneur is reflected in his overall leadership and forward-looking vision of enterprise development, as well as in how much empowerment he and the enterprises he creates can bring to the industry's development.Recently, Shurick Agapitov, CEO and founder of Xsola, came to China to gain a deep understanding of China's gaming technology and corporate development status, and redefine Xsola's strategic layout in the Chinese market

The value of an entrepreneur is reflected in his overall leadership and forward-looking vision of enterprise development, as well as in how much empowerment he and the enterprises he creates can bring to the industry's development.

Recently, Shurick Agapitov, CEO and founder of Xsola, came to China to gain a deep understanding of China's gaming technology and corporate development status, and redefine Xsola's strategic layout in the Chinese market.

In his past leadership career, ShurickAgapitov has personally experienced the rise and rapid growth of global online games, constructed Xsolla's global development path, boosted the growth of global gaming industry output, and focused on bringing Xsolla into the Chinese market, improving its global layout, utilizing China's resource advantages, and empowering Chinese gaming companies to go overseas and "dig gold", I hope to use Xsolla's professional services to help Chinese game developers achieve stability and prosperity in overseas markets.

Led the "giant ship" of Xsolla in the global gaming market for 18 years, although in a hurry, ShurickAgapitov still demonstrated his industry sedimentation and high sensitivity during the interview.

The following is an interview transcript:

Reporter:As the founder, how did you position Xsolla? Why choose to enter the Chinese market?

ShurickAgapitov:I am ShurickAgapitov, the founder of Xsolla. Xsolla has always been a game commercial company that helps game developers make money. My main focus is online gaming, and I have been working in this industry for 18 years. Our main job is to assist game developers in selling game items, subscriptions, and virtual currencies. We are now an aggregated payment company and we hope to become a company that can help online gaming companies identify and seize market opportunities, which may be related to user acquisition, so we need to help them find users and financial support, not just payment and overseas compliance.

I believe that online games will continue to develop in the future. We know that the Internet will develop into a metaverse. I believe that the significance of online games has surpassed the technology itself, not just the production of online games. We will also establish a new internet, which will be a metaverse. We will help Chinese companies go overseas and establish connections with overseas consumers.

When I am at home in Los Angeles or go to any corner of the world, I find that many things around me are made in China. I believe that China has great potential in developing online games, creating amazing online gaming experiences, and competing with global companies. Therefore, what we are doing is helping Chinese made games go overseas.

Reporter:How can Xsolla help Chinese gaming companies go global?

ShurickAgapitov:Xsolla can help Chinese game developers add local payment options, add local compliance, and establish connections with local internet celebrities. These can establish a lot of trust for potential buyers, allowing consumers to spend more confidently. Users need to feel secure. If the user is not satisfied with the product, we can also provide a refund opportunity. In this case, I can also provide three different refund settings for game developers to control. They can be very strict or very generous with refunds. With our help, if consumers do not like it, they can request a refund at any time. We see that this helps game developers sell more products because it can bring a sense of security to consumers. In addition to a sense of security, managing credit cards is also important. This is what Xsolla can help Chinese game manufacturers. In addition, when game developers collaborate with Xsolla, they may collect user email information and phone numbers, which provides an opportunity to communicate and interact with users again, helping them establish relationships with consumers.

We assist Chinese game developers in launching games in overseas markets, not only in terms of payment, refund, and tax compliance, but also in developing strategies for entering overseas markets, developing websites for Western markets, interacting with local internet celebrities, and distributing games to channels such as YouTube and Twitch. We are helping them create recommendation plans, And collaborate with different branches, which we call the Xsolla Partner Network. We release approximately 600 games every year, so we also learn from our customers because our customers are located all over the world, and game developers are located all over the world. We are pleased to be a partner of Chinese game developers who want to distribute games overseas.

Reporter:What do you think is the key for Chinese gaming companies to operate overseas?

ShurickAgapitov:I believe compliance is the top priority for every business owner. We live in a world filled with big data, where every transaction has a digital fingerprint and game developers cannot hide any content. Therefore, it is very important for game developers or any enterprise to comply with local and international laws. In addition, the current requirements for privacy regulations are becoming increasingly strict, and I believe that the next wave of changes in the future will be the issue of internet child safety as a concern for parents. I also believe that when games are directly aimed at consumers, parental control is very important, and game developers must consider this. Their collaboration with Xsolla must also consider this, and I believe this will be the next major compliance. When children play online games and trade in the online games you develop, you may encounter difficulties in certain countries/regions and may also be punished and held accountable for this. Making game developers aware of local situations and complying with regulations is Xsolla's mission and core mission.

Reporter:What are the advantages of Xsolla compared to other service companies?

ShurickAgapitov:Xsolla has strong research and development capabilities. We started in Russia and now have a research and development center in Malaysia and also in North Carolina. We plan to also open offices in Canada and Brazil, but I believe that in China, we have high potential and high-quality talents with e-commerce backgrounds, which will enable us to build a metaverse stack well. I believe that in the future, developers can distribute digital items to game players, view content, and you can see how others play games and earn free items in online games. I believe that Xsolla will occupy a unique position in the industry in the future, as we are collaborating with 4000 different game developers. It can be imagined that there are currently 350 million people playing online games, and whenever we try to acquire new users, we need to pay high fees to Facebook and Google to acquire new users. I think game developers can collaborate with us because Xsolla can help every game company find more users. I believe that Chinese game developers have great potential and opportunities to sell their games in the global market and compete with European and American companies. I believe that a well crafted and good game will be popular. Games need to undergo localized changes in the local market, but game kernels made in China can remain unchanged, which is the assistance Xsolla can provide to Chinese game developers.

Coming to the Chinese market, ShurickAgapitov saw the competitive advantage of Chinese game developers in the European, American, and even global markets with his sharp business vision. In fact, after entering the local market, Chinese game companies face difficulties such as product localization, traffic acquisition, local policies and regulations, payment security, and compliance, which are like waves at sea, hindering their overseas development pace. As ShurickAgapitov said, addressing these challenges happens to be Xsolla's strength. From the interview, it can be learned that for ShurickAgapitov and Xsolla, the new strategic goal in the Chinese market is to "sail on the sea", helping potential game developers in China quickly "snipe" emerging markets, achieve cost reduction and efficiency increase, and smoothly open up the "last mile" of game commercialization, releasing positive profits. Accompanying each other and serving the process of Chinese enterprises going overseas, Xsolla will also receive a new round of growth opportunities.

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