Gaikai to add 10 million monthly active users by fall 2011

Gaikai looks to add 10 million monthly active users by fall 2011 through affiliate programs, plus the users wishes to attract as retail partners.

The firm announced a partnership with Walmart this week, and European partners are to be announced soon.

"Our first target is to get ten million monthly uniques that we can push these game experiences out to as a way to help the publishers and the online retailers address more audience," Gaiaki CSO Nanea Reeves told GI.biz.

Gaikai is currently looking at ways to help its publishing partners to reach users via multiple formats, which would reach consumers through various devices that can carry a standard Internet connection. It is also looking at hardware which will games more playable on alternative hardware, which would allow users to not necessarily have to use their TVs to play games.

"The challenge is you get a customer that might be playing a game in their browser but they can't play the game on their Mac," explained Reeves. "In that case we've been approached – how do we support that customer, and can we transition them to an always on full game stream?

"If our business is to help all of the partners scale their business we have to be ready across multiple fronts. And the nice thing about this solution is that it doesn't require any custom chip to be included in the device or separate unit. We're straight on the existing infrastructure."

Gaikai also allows games to be embedded through sites like Facebook, which Reeves says is not really hard to do.

"OnLive is announcing that they're launching from Facebook... we're actually embedded in there," Reeves commented. "We like those guys, they've done a great job, it's just a very different business model."