In FY25 a Bengaluru studio built on a Teen Patti app booked ₹329.9 crore ($34.4 million) in revenue and about ₹97 crore in profit after tax, and not one rupee of it came from real-money gambling. That single design choice is the reason Moonfrog Labs kept running through India’s 2025 ban on online money games, the law that forced far larger rivals to switch off their cash tables overnight.
Moonfrog is a rare thing in Indian gaming: a company that looks like a card-and-dice betting business but is legally a maker of free entertainment. Its chips are virtual, its games are downloaded free, and its money comes from players buying more chips or watching ads. It was founded by ex-Zynga engineers in 2013, raised roughly $16 million and then went quiet for six years, and finally exited not to an Indian buyer but to a Swedish games group, Stillfront, for about $90 million for the first 91% of the company. This is how a small studio turned a cultural card game into a durable, profitable franchise.
Quick facts
| Company | Moonfrog Labs Private Limited (CIN U72400KA2013PTC072054), Bengaluru, Karnataka |
| Founded | 2013 |
| Founders | Tanay Tayal, Ankit Jain, Kumar Puspesh, Oliver Jones, Dimpalkumar Maisuriya (ex-Zynga) |
| Businesses | Free-to-play mobile games: Teen Patti Gold, Ludo Club, Rummy Gold, Jalebi, Parchis Club and others |
| Latest FY revenue | ₹329.9 crore (FY25), up 9.4% from ₹301.5 crore in FY24 (per Inc42, compiled from filings) |
| Latest FY profit | Profit after tax about ₹97.0 crore in FY25; ₹107.4 crore in FY24 (per Inc42/thekredible) |
| Listed | Private; wholly owned subsidiary of Stillfront Group AB (listed on Nasdaq Stockholm) |
| Last valuation / exit | Acquired by Stillfront: about $90 million for the first 91% (completed 26 February 2021), plus EBITDA-linked earnout tranches for the rest |
| Key shareholder | Stillfront Group AB (Sweden) |
What Moonfrog does
Moonfrog Labs builds and operates free-to-play mobile games aimed mainly at Indian players, then earns from in-app purchases and advertising rather than from any wager. Its catalogue centres on social versions of games Indians already play in living rooms and at festivals.
- Teen Patti Gold — its flagship, a free-to-play social card game described by the company as “entertainment-only”, where all chips are virtual and there is no real-money gambling; reported at over 6 million monthly active players globally (company/Google Play).
- Ludo Club — a multiplayer dice-and-board game, one of the studio’s biggest download drivers on Google Play (Google Play listing).
- Other titles — Rummy Gold, Jalebi and Parchis Club round out a portfolio built on familiar card and board formats (company site).
The important distinction, and the one most people get wrong, is that Moonfrog’s card games are not real-money gaming. Players cannot cash out virtual chips. That places the studio in the “social casino” and casual category rather than the real-money gaming (RMG) category that Indian regulators moved against in 2025.
The founding insight
Moonfrog was started in 2013 by five people who had spent their careers building for the world’s biggest social-games company. Tanay Tayal, Ankit Jain, Kumar Puspesh, Oliver Jones and Dimpalkumar Maisuriya came out of Zynga, where they had worked on titles such as Mafia Wars, Bubble Safari, CastleVille and Empires & Allies. They knew how free-to-play mechanics, live operations and social hooks worked at scale.
The insight was simple and, at the time, contrarian: instead of chasing global casual audiences with generic titles, build for India first, using games Indians already understood culturally. Teen Patti and Ludo need no tutorial in an Indian household. That cut acquisition friction and let the studio lean on word-of-mouth and family play. The founders were betting that a smartphone-first India would happily spend small amounts to keep playing the games it grew up with, if the experience was social and the download was free.
The struggle years
The early record was not a straight line. Two hard stretches stand out, and both are visible in the public trail rather than in company spin.
- A narrow bet in a crowded genre. The founders came from global casual gaming, but Moonfrog’s future turned out to depend on a much smaller, India-specific niche of social card and board games. Backing culturally rooted titles like Teen Patti Gold and Ludo Club meant walking away from the broad casual categories its Zynga-trained team knew best, and competing in a segment crowded with clones and copycats.
- Six years without a fresh institutional round. After the March 2015 Series A, there is no record of Moonfrog raising another external equity round until its 2021 exit. For a venture-backed startup, a six-year funding gap is unusual and unforgiving: it meant the studio had to fund its own growth from game revenue rather than from investor cash, with no big war chest to absorb a run of underperforming launches.
The upside of that discipline is that by the time a buyer looked closely, Moonfrog was a real, cash-generating business rather than a growth-at-all-costs story. The downside is that it spent years proving it could stand on its own before anyone wrote the next cheque.
The turning point
The single defining event was the sale to Stillfront Group in early 2021. Stillfront announced the deal on 1 February 2021 and completed the first tranche on 26 February 2021, buying 91% of Moonfrog for about $90 million on a cash-and-debt-free basis. The remaining 9% was structured to be acquired through up to three further tranches, priced against Moonfrog’s future EBITDA.
The numbers on each side of that event tell the story. Moonfrog had raised only about $16 million in equity across its life, a $1 million seed and a $15 million Series A. It exited at roughly $90 million for 91% of the company, implying a value of close to $99 million for the whole business. A studio that had gone six years without raising had, in effect, converted patience and profitability into a nine-figure exit, and into a permanent home inside a listed European games group with the balance sheet to fund new titles.
The money behind it
Moonfrog’s cap table is short, which is part of what makes the exit multiple striking. The funding shape:
- Seed — about $1 million, February 2014, Sequoia Capital. The first institutional cheque, backing an unproven ex-Zynga team (TechCrunch/YourStory).
- Series A — $15 million, 11 March 2015, Tiger Global and Sequoia Capital. The round that funded the studio’s push and remained its last external raise for years (TechCrunch/Inc42/Business Standard).
- Total raised — about $16 million across two rounds (Inc42).
What each backer changed:
- Sequoia Capital — seeded the company and then doubled down at Series A, giving an early-stage team credibility and runway before it had a hit.
- Tiger Global — brought the growth capital in 2015 that let Moonfrog invest in live operations and user acquisition for its India-first titles.
- Stillfront Group — the 2021 acquirer, which turned the founders’ and investors’ paper into cash and folded Moonfrog into a portfolio of free-to-play studios, with earnouts that rewarded Moonfrog for continuing to grow EBITDA after the deal.
The latest ownership position is unambiguous: Moonfrog is a subsidiary of Stillfront Group AB, listed in Stockholm. Its “valuation” as a standalone startup is therefore historical; the meaningful number is the roughly $90 million paid for the first 91% in 2021, plus earnout consideration tied to performance.
How it makes money
The model is classic free-to-play, adapted for Indian price points. Money comes in through two doors and the margin sits in content and live operations rather than in physical goods.
- In-app purchases. Players download free and buy virtual chips, coins or cosmetic items to keep playing longer or at higher stakes tables. Because the chips have no cash-out value, this is spending on entertainment, not gambling (company terms).
- Advertising. Free players are monetised through in-game ads, a second revenue stream layered on top of purchases (company/coverage).
Where the margin sits: the marginal cost of one more player is close to zero once a game is live, so the economics turn on two things: the cost of acquiring players (marketing) and the cost of keeping them engaged (live-ops, events, new content). Moonfrog’s FY25 accounts show the shape of a lean digital business, with total expenses of about ₹184.6 crore against ₹329.9 crore of revenue, leaving reported EBITDA of roughly ₹158.2 crore (per Inc42’s compiled figures). The part outsiders get wrong is assuming a Teen Patti app must be a betting business; here the take is a software margin on virtual goods, not a rake on wagers.
The numbers
Three years of the top and bottom line, in ₹ crore. Revenue growth has slowed as the base has grown, and profit dipped in FY25 even as revenue rose, a sign of higher costs or investment.
| Fiscal year | Operating revenue (₹ crore) | YoY growth | Profit after tax (₹ crore) |
| FY23 | 259.8 | — | Not disclosed in compiled filings |
| FY24 | 301.5 | +16.0% | 107.4 |
| FY25 | 329.9 | +9.4% | 97.0 |
Sources: Inc42 and thekredible, compiled from the company’s Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) filings. FY24 revenue is quoted at ₹301.2–301.5 crore across sources; the difference is rounding. One source lists FY25 profit after tax in a ₹97.0–108.6 crore range; the ₹97.0 crore figure is used here as the consistent value. These are third-party compilations of statutory filings, not figures I have audited.
Where the money comes from
Moonfrog does not publish a public segment breakdown, so the honest split is by product and by mechanic rather than by audited line item. What the record supports:
- By product — the business is concentrated in a few flagship titles, led by Teen Patti Gold (reported 6 million-plus monthly active players globally) and Ludo Club, with Rummy Gold, Jalebi and Parchis Club behind them (company/Google Play).
- By mechanic — revenue is dominated by in-app purchases of virtual chips and items, supplemented by advertising to non-paying players (company terms/coverage).
- By geography — the studio is built India-first, using games with deep local familiarity, though Teen Patti Gold’s player base is described as global, indicating a diaspora and overseas tail on top of the domestic core (company).
The surprise is the concentration: a company that reports a nine-figure rupee revenue and a software-grade margin rests heavily on a handful of culturally specific titles. That is a strength for focus and a risk for resilience, both at once.
The risks
- Regulatory reclassification. India’s Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act, 2025 (assented 22 August 2025) bans online money games outright, whether skill or chance, with penalties up to three years in jail or a ₹1 crore fine. Moonfrog’s titles are free-to-play with virtual chips and no cash-out, so they sit outside the money-gaming ban, but any future tightening of rules for “social casino” formats, or how card games are marketed, would land directly on its flagship. The regulatory line between “entertainment” Teen Patti and “gambling” Teen Patti is exactly where Moonfrog lives.
- Tax and platform exposure. India levies 28% GST on online gaming, and app-store payment and content policies govern how virtual goods are sold and how card-themed games are listed. Changes on either front squeeze the in-app-purchase margin that the whole model rests on.
- Product concentration and slowing growth. Revenue growth cooled from about 16.0% in FY24 to 9.4% in FY25, and profit after tax fell year on year even as revenue rose. With the business leaning on a small set of ageing hit titles, a decline in Teen Patti Gold or Ludo Club engagement, or a failure to launch the next hit, would show up quickly in the top line.
The takeaway
Moonfrog’s transferable lesson is about where you draw the line, not how fast you grow. By building card games that feel like gambling but legally are not, the studio captured the cultural pull of Teen Patti and Ludo while sidestepping the regulatory fate that later hit real-money operators. It raised little, spent years proving it could fund itself, and turned that discipline into a nine-figure exit and a durable, profitable franchise inside a listed global group. The lesson for founders: a clear, defensible position on the right side of a regulatory line can be worth more than any growth rate, and it is easiest to hold when you have built the business to stand on its own cash.
Frequently asked questions
Is Moonfrog Labs part of Gameskraft?
No. Moonfrog Labs is not owned by Gameskraft. It is a subsidiary of Sweden’s Stillfront Group AB, which acquired the first 91% of the company for about $90 million in February 2021 and structured the remaining shares as EBITDA-linked earnouts.
Does Teen Patti Gold involve real-money gambling?
No. According to Moonfrog, Teen Patti Gold is a free-to-play, entertainment-only game in which all chips are virtual and cannot be cashed out. That is what places it outside India’s 2025 ban on online money games.
Who founded Moonfrog Labs and when?
It was founded in 2013 by Tanay Tayal, Ankit Jain, Kumar Puspesh, Oliver Jones and Dimpalkumar Maisuriya, a team of former Zynga developers who had worked on titles including Mafia Wars and CastleVille.
How much money did Moonfrog raise?
About $16 million in total: a roughly $1 million seed from Sequoia Capital in 2014 and a $15 million Series A from Tiger Global and Sequoia Capital in March 2015. It did not raise another external round before its 2021 acquisition.
How much does Moonfrog earn?
Per figures compiled from its MCA filings, Moonfrog reported revenue of about ₹329.9 crore in FY25 (up 9.4% from ₹301.5 crore in FY24) and profit after tax of roughly ₹97.0 crore in FY25, against ₹107.4 crore in FY24.
Sources
Figures are as of September 2026. Currency converted at $1 ≈ ₹96.0 as of 18 September 2026 (Trading Economics).
- Inc42 — Moonfrog Labs company, funding and financials profile (September 2026)
- Inc42 — “Sweden-Based Stillfront Acquires Teen Patti Creator Moonfrog Labs” (February 2021)
- Stillfront Group — “Stillfront Group completes the acquisition of Moonfrog Labs” press release (February 2021)
- Stillfront Group — “Stillfront Group acquires Moonfrog and enters the Indian subcontinent” (February 2021)
- TechCrunch — “Indian Mobile Game Developer Moonfrog Labs Nabs $15M From Tiger And Sequoia” (March 2015)
- YourStory — Moonfrog seed and Series A coverage; Stillfront acquisition (2015; February 2021)
- Business Standard — “Bengaluru-based gaming firm Moonfrog Labs raises $15 mn from Tiger, Sequoia” (March 2015)
- Tofler / MCA — Moonfrog Labs Private Limited, CIN U72400KA2013PTC072054 (2026)
- thekredible — Moonfrog financial information, revenue and profit/loss (2026)
- Moonfrog Labs — company website, About Us, Our Games and Terms of Service (2026)
- Google Play — Ludo Club and Teen Patti Gold listings (2026)
- Wikipedia and PIB — Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act, 2025 (August 2025)
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