Ubisoft + India = Ubindia?

Ubisoft, one of the world’s most prolific video game publishers, announced last month that it has acquired Gameloft’s development studio in Pune, India. The studio, established at the end of 2006, currently has a team of 120 developers and testers, with a goal of 200 within 12 months and 500 “in the coming years.” They will be concentrating on porting Ubi’s titles to handhelds and strengthening their testing teams.

Christine Burgess-Quémard, executive director, worldwide studios at Ubisoft, claims: “Following on the recent announcement of our new Singapore studio, this acquisition will reinforce Ubisoft’s presence in Asia and the southeast region in particular. India has a promising future in the videogame industry and this is an opportunity for us to establish ourselves in the country.”

Thankfully, the former Gameloft studio (and Gameloft as a whole) specializes in development for handhelds and mobile phones. They are developing 15 games for the iPhone, all of which are planned to be released by the end of 2008.

Seems like a good move for Ubisoft. Pune has an extensive university system and graduates over 80,000 engineers a year. This, coupled with the fact that the studio has experience with handheld games, might allow the large publisher to release something decent on a handheld.