Angry Birds downloaded 2 billion times, has as many MAUs as Twitter

Angry Birds has achieved a whopping 2 billion downloads in the four years since it captured the casual market, Rovio has revealed.

The figure comes directly from Rovio CMO Peter Vesterbacka, speaking at Pocket Gamer Connects in London, as reported by Mobile Entertainment.

"If you look at Rovio and what we've done over four years, there are now two billion copies of Angry Birds out there," he said.

"Download figures tell you nothing about engagement, but we still have 200 million people playing Angry Birds every month, the size of the Twitter audience."

Joking that "Candy Crush's half a billion installs is a good start", Vesterbacka said that Angry Birds' success has gone beyond even his ambitious predictions.

"I thought I was super-ambitious in 2010 when I said we'll make $100 million and everyone else thought I was crazy, but it's very important people thought I was insane for saying $100 million back then," he said.

Rovio's focus on turning Angry Birds into a brand is part of the success story, the executive explained.

"With Angry Birds we built the fastest-growing brand ever. Nine out of ten people in the US know the brand and 93% of the Chinese population knows the brand," he said.

"We're not building Angry Birds for a hundred days but for a hundred years. We launched an iPhone game in 2009 and now 45 per cent of our business comes from physical products, including drinks – we're giving Coke a run for their money."

Citing Mario and Mickey Mouse as examples of brands that preceded Angry Birds, Vesterbacka seemed to suggest Rovio expects eventually to take down even these titans.

"What started as a little game is a major brand and franchise. Our friends at Disney are still a bit ahead but our trajectory looks good. We're just getting started," he said.

Thanks, MCV Pacific.