Home to over 600 million gamers, mostly mobile-first, India is experiencing a massive boom in the mobile gaming arena. This growth is notably led by those living in Tier 2/3 cities due to factors such as affordable smartphones and internet access, localised content, and increased disposable income. Consequently, the country has become a leader with mobile game downloads reaching 15.2 billion in FY24. Once an ideal avenue of entertainment, gaming, over the years, has evolved into a medium of building culture, community, and even fostering economic growth. In a way, this evolution presents a new frontier for the Indian gaming sector. From being a massive consumption market, the country can now harness the strategic opportunity of transforming itself into a global leader through monetisation, esports, and the creation of Intellectual Property (IP).
Monetisation: Keeping up with the gamers
That gamers in India are more than willing to pay for a culturally relevant and aspirational gaming experience is an exciting trend for game publishers. It has been observed that microtransactions, such as offering skins, battle passes, and event-linked rewards, are at an all-time high. Games developed around festival themes or those that follow localised formats seem to be performing well.
However, a key obstacle that limits the industry’s prospects of near-term monetisation of games is the relatively low Average Revenue Per User (ARPU), compared to other countries. To solve this issue, publishers will have to look at tailor-made monetisation models that meet the preferences of Indian consumers. Be it through microtransactions, festival-driven content, or bundled services, it can certainly bring in significant growth.
While monetisation through in-game purchases is a great step for improving revenue, the real success of a gaming business is hinged on balancing it with trust of the gamers. More recently, gamers in India tend to engage more and be loyal with games that offer a full-fledged reward system. From paying for features like additional lives or boosters, that help players to navigate the game effectively, they now lean towards festival discounts and mobile recharge tie-ins for instant gratification. However, be it branded items or limited-time rewards, everything needs to be seamlessly weaved into the play, rather than making it intrusive. This is probably the best way to gain a gamer’s trust.
Esports and IP creation can give India a competitive edge
In an encouraging step, the Government of India has officially declared esports to be a part of the multi-sports event category. This also sets a strong foundation for India’s esports market, which though at a nascent stage, is projected to scale as a high growth market in the global arena which is expected to reach US$ 16.7 billion by 2033.
That esports are highly popular among gamers is already being witnessed at the annual flagship tournaments that have been hosted across the country in recent times. Besides giving a boost to the gaming sector these are also responsible for shaping talent pipelines and creating employment. Though currently, an uneven talent pipeline across functions including design, publishing, and technology, makes it difficult to build an experienced employee ecosystem, experts estimate that the sector can create over two million high-skilled jobs.
Furthermore, esports are evolving into a cultural spectacle blending gaming, lifestyle, and celebrity culture and driving youth identity. Elements such as large prize pools and structured formats attract top players and inspire aspirational play. Such a community-first ecosystem helps to strengthen loyalty and cements gaming as part of India’s entertainment mainstream. While a structured development of esports ecosystems and a strong talent pool, presents a huge opportunity for India to transform into a global gaming hub, creation of IP will help safeguard a game’s core elements. This includes localised content that has cultural storytelling at its core.
Defining global gaming: Going beyond the play
Reports assessing India’s place in the global gaming market indicate that the country’s gaming market can grow at a CAGR of ~19% to reach US$ 9.2 billion in the next four years from US$ 3.8 billion in 2024. The country’s gaming domain differs from the US, Korea, and China, in terms that microtransactions dominate, subscriptions are rare, and mobile-first scale drives growth.
Global benchmarks are useful to navigate the spectrum toward growth, but India requires nation-specific strategies. This will involve localised content, sachet pricing, and UPI-friendly transactions. Games with brands and celebrity collaboration, helps scale the reach and even make them a mainstream medium. For instance, when a renowned Bollywood actor participates in an exclusive in-game tie-up, it increases the aspirational level of the game, roping in more players.
India’s innovations in scale-driven, culturally tuned monetisation gaming could influence other emerging markets. It is already poised to move from being a high consumption market to a global publishing leader. Today, gaming makes up for 29.6% of India’s New Media market (US$ 12.5 B), surpassing the share of other channels of mass entertainment such as OTT, audio, animation, and social media. Against this backdrop, game publishers in the country are showcasing an increased confidence in its potential. They are keen to step up and unlock the next leap in the sector. However, only those who offer gaming content that resonates culturally and follows strategic in-game monetisation will reach the success line.
Based on the current scenario the next decade offers India a chance not just to dominate game downloads, but to shape global gaming trends, careers, and IP creation.
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![Who is John Ternus, the incoming Apple CEO? | TechCrunch
After 15 years, Tim Cook will hand off the Apple CEO role to John Ternus, the company’s senior vice president of hardware engineering. Starting on September 1, Ternus will lead one of the world’s most valuable companies, but if you’re not a dedicated Apple enthusiast, you’ve probably never heard of this man, who has largely remained out of the spotlight until now.
How long has John Ternus worked at Apple?
Ternus has worked at Apple for nearly half of his life — now 51 years old, he has been with the company for 25 years.
He joined Apple’s product design team in 2001 as only his second job out of college (his first was at a small maker of virtual-reality devices called Virtual Research Systems). By 2013, Ternus was a VP of hardware engineering and was promoted to the SVP role in 2021.
Ternus — who is 15 years younger than Cook — was among the youngest of top Apple executives who had been rumored as a possible successor, implying that Apple could be looking for someone to lead the company for a long time. After all, Apple has only had two CEOs in this millennium, so it seems that leadership continuity is important to the company.
Ternus reports to Cook, who he considers a mentor, and leads all of hardware engineering at Apple. That’s a pretty big deal for a company that’s known for ubiquitous hardware like the iPhone and the MacBook.
In his 2024 commencement speech at his alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania’s engineering school, Ternus reflected on the lessons he learned at Apple, which perhaps can tell us a bit about his character — or at least a sanitized version of it.
“Always assume you’re as smart as anyone else in the room, but never assume that you know as much as they do,” Ternus said in the speech. “With this mindset, you’ll find the confidence you need to push forward, but more importantly, the humility to ask questions.”
Techcrunch event
San Francisco, CA
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October 13-15, 2026
In a tech ecosystem populated with abrasive egos, it’s refreshing to hear Ternus utter the word “humility.” Better yet, he doesn’t appear to have an X account.
Image Credits:Apple
What projects did John Ternus lead at Apple?
Ternus’ earliest project at Apple involved scrutinizing parts for the Apple Cinema Display, an early desktop monitor.
“At some point in my first year, I found myself at a supplier facility. I was far away from home. Well past midnight, I was using a magnifying glass to count the number of grooves on the head of a screw … and I was arguing with the supplier because these parts had 35 grooves. They were supposed to have 25,” Ternus recalled in his commencement speech. “I distinctly remember stepping back for a minute and thinking, ‘What the hell am I doing? Is this normal?’”
As Ternus climbed the corporate ladder, his responsibilities grew. He may no longer spend as much time analyzing screws, but he still seems to take pride in getting the little details right. In a recent interview, when Ternus was asked about his favorite memory of Steve Jobs, he mentioned the former Apple co-founder’s attention to craftsmanship.
“[Jobs] was moving a piece of furniture, a chest of drawers, and pulled it away from the wall and looked at the back and was just reflecting on, you know, that the carpenter who made it had made it beautiful,” Ternus said. “It finished the back as beautifully as the rest of it, even though nobody was going to see it, right? And I think about that all the time because I think that perfectly exemplifies what we do here.”
From there, he went on to lead the hardware development behind products across the Apple ecosystem, overseeing launches like AirPods, Apple Watch, and the Vision Pro. He also had a hand in major technical upgrades at Apple, like Apple’s transition from Intel chips to its own proprietary Apple silicon.
Most recently, Ternus was involved in the production of the MacBook Neo, Apple’s new, more affordable laptop model that lowers costs through some clever trade-offs in hardware design, like using an iPhone chip to power the device.
“We never want to ship junk. We want to ship great products that have that Apple experience, that Apple quality. To do that with the Neo required building something completely new from the ground up … leveraging both the technologies we’d been developing like Apple silicon, but also the kind of expertise that we’ve developed over many, many years of building Macs, and building phones, and building iPads, and all of these things,” Ternus told Tom’s Guide.
As CEO, Ternus will have to steer Apple through its challenge to catch up in the AI race and figure out what to do with the underlying tech behind the Vision Pro.
What else do we know about John Ternus?
Ternus was on the swim team at Penn. For his senior project, he built a feeding arm that people with quadriplegia could control with head movements.
According to public records of political donations, Ternus donated ,900 to Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) in 2021.
Otherwise, Ternus has maintained a relatively low profile.
#John #Ternus #incoming #Apple #CEO #TechCrunchApple,ceo,John Ternus,Tim Cook Who is John Ternus, the incoming Apple CEO? | TechCrunch
After 15 years, Tim Cook will hand off the Apple CEO role to John Ternus, the company’s senior vice president of hardware engineering. Starting on September 1, Ternus will lead one of the world’s most valuable companies, but if you’re not a dedicated Apple enthusiast, you’ve probably never heard of this man, who has largely remained out of the spotlight until now.
How long has John Ternus worked at Apple?
Ternus has worked at Apple for nearly half of his life — now 51 years old, he has been with the company for 25 years.
He joined Apple’s product design team in 2001 as only his second job out of college (his first was at a small maker of virtual-reality devices called Virtual Research Systems). By 2013, Ternus was a VP of hardware engineering and was promoted to the SVP role in 2021.
Ternus — who is 15 years younger than Cook — was among the youngest of top Apple executives who had been rumored as a possible successor, implying that Apple could be looking for someone to lead the company for a long time. After all, Apple has only had two CEOs in this millennium, so it seems that leadership continuity is important to the company.
Ternus reports to Cook, who he considers a mentor, and leads all of hardware engineering at Apple. That’s a pretty big deal for a company that’s known for ubiquitous hardware like the iPhone and the MacBook.
In his 2024 commencement speech at his alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania’s engineering school, Ternus reflected on the lessons he learned at Apple, which perhaps can tell us a bit about his character — or at least a sanitized version of it.
“Always assume you’re as smart as anyone else in the room, but never assume that you know as much as they do,” Ternus said in the speech. “With this mindset, you’ll find the confidence you need to push forward, but more importantly, the humility to ask questions.”
Techcrunch event
San Francisco, CA
|
October 13-15, 2026
In a tech ecosystem populated with abrasive egos, it’s refreshing to hear Ternus utter the word “humility.” Better yet, he doesn’t appear to have an X account.
Image Credits:Apple
What projects did John Ternus lead at Apple?
Ternus’ earliest project at Apple involved scrutinizing parts for the Apple Cinema Display, an early desktop monitor.
“At some point in my first year, I found myself at a supplier facility. I was far away from home. Well past midnight, I was using a magnifying glass to count the number of grooves on the head of a screw … and I was arguing with the supplier because these parts had 35 grooves. They were supposed to have 25,” Ternus recalled in his commencement speech. “I distinctly remember stepping back for a minute and thinking, ‘What the hell am I doing? Is this normal?’”
As Ternus climbed the corporate ladder, his responsibilities grew. He may no longer spend as much time analyzing screws, but he still seems to take pride in getting the little details right. In a recent interview, when Ternus was asked about his favorite memory of Steve Jobs, he mentioned the former Apple co-founder’s attention to craftsmanship.
“[Jobs] was moving a piece of furniture, a chest of drawers, and pulled it away from the wall and looked at the back and was just reflecting on, you know, that the carpenter who made it had made it beautiful,” Ternus said. “It finished the back as beautifully as the rest of it, even though nobody was going to see it, right? And I think about that all the time because I think that perfectly exemplifies what we do here.”
From there, he went on to lead the hardware development behind products across the Apple ecosystem, overseeing launches like AirPods, Apple Watch, and the Vision Pro. He also had a hand in major technical upgrades at Apple, like Apple’s transition from Intel chips to its own proprietary Apple silicon.
Most recently, Ternus was involved in the production of the MacBook Neo, Apple’s new, more affordable laptop model that lowers costs through some clever trade-offs in hardware design, like using an iPhone chip to power the device.
“We never want to ship junk. We want to ship great products that have that Apple experience, that Apple quality. To do that with the Neo required building something completely new from the ground up … leveraging both the technologies we’d been developing like Apple silicon, but also the kind of expertise that we’ve developed over many, many years of building Macs, and building phones, and building iPads, and all of these things,” Ternus told Tom’s Guide.
As CEO, Ternus will have to steer Apple through its challenge to catch up in the AI race and figure out what to do with the underlying tech behind the Vision Pro.
What else do we know about John Ternus?
Ternus was on the swim team at Penn. For his senior project, he built a feeding arm that people with quadriplegia could control with head movements.
According to public records of political donations, Ternus donated ,900 to Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) in 2021.
Otherwise, Ternus has maintained a relatively low profile.
#John #Ternus #incoming #Apple #CEO #TechCrunchApple,ceo,John Ternus,Tim Cook](https://techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/Apple-John-Ternus-Tim-Cook_Full-Bleed-Image.jpg.xlarge_2x.jpg?w=680)
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