Google's upcoming a social-gaming startup is Arcade

Google's upcoming a social-gaming startup is Arcade

Google is secretly building a social-gaming startup, part of its effort to create fledgling companies within the internet-search giant. Google is reportedly helping young tech entrepreneur Michael Sayman build and launch a social gaming startup.Sayman is the 21-year-old wunderkind who started as a Facebook Inc. intern at age 17 and left that company for Alphabet Inc.’s Google last year. Arcade’s first app, slated to debut this summer, will have some elements of a trivia game.

A Google spokesperson confirmed the existence of Arcade, saying it was “focused on mobile gaming with friends,” without elaborating on specific products. “It’s a very early experiment so there aren’t many details to share right now.” 

The effort is part of Area 120, a division where select employees can work on small startups that live inside Google. Started in 2016, Area 120 has churned out some new units squarely in Google’s orbit, such as Chatbase, which provides bot analytics software. Other projects have already shut down, like one called Supersonic that tried to convert voice messages into emojis.

Arcade is said to be independent of any existing social media service — all users would need to do is register with their mobile numbers and start playing. Therefore, you would need to have someone’s mobile number in order to play with them. Google hasn’t elaborated any further on this report yet.