Ilkka Paananen
Supercell
Mobile game studio behind Clash of Clans, Clash Royale and Brawl Stars · Helsinki, Finland
The founder
Ilkka Paananen co-founded Supercell in 2010 after a previous mobile-gaming venture, Sumea, was sold to Digital Chocolate. He built Supercell around small, autonomous "cell" teams empowered to kill their own games — famously celebrating cancelled projects rather than punishing failure. He remains CEO, having retained operational control through two separate majority-stake sales, and holds a BAFTA Fellowship for contributions to gaming.
How it was sold
SoftBank bought a 51% stake in Supercell for $1.5 billion in 2013, later raising its stake to 73.2% by 2015. In June 2016, a Tencent-led consortium bought out SoftBank’s entire holding (plus additional shares, ~84.3% total) for $8.6 billion, valuing Supercell at $10.2 billion — one of the largest gaming acquisitions in history at the time, with Paananen’s team continuing to run the company independently under both owners.
Sourced & verified
In the news
Coverage of the Supercell deal from independent outlets — read the original reporting, not just our summary.