Garena Free Fire’s India Future Remains Uncertain Eight Months After Relaunch

Sea’s Garena is scrambling to relaunch its popular mobile title Free Fire in India, more than eight months after the launch party in the South Asian market.

Forrest Li Xiaodong, Founder, Chairman and CEO of Sea, told analysts on the call Wednesday that his firm was working with stakeholders in India for the relaunch.

Garena, the gaming unit of Sea, last year announced plans to relaunch Free Fire in India, marking a return more than a year and a half after the title was banned by New Delhi over national security concerns.

The firm — which has partnered with Yotta, controlled by the local giant Hiranandani, for cloud and other storage needs of local users’ data in the country — initially said it will release the title in India on September 5 (2023). The subpar communication from the firm has already angered many gamers and entrepreneurs in the country.

Here’s what Li Xiaodong said Tuesday:

For Free Fire relaunch in India, at this moment, we are actively working with order — like stakeholders, including like the regulators, the potential local partners, right? And to figure out what is the best plan to relaunch Free Fire in India. And well, if that is successful, I think that will be a meaningful potential upside in terms of the users and the bookings considering India is a very, very big market. And — but just to clarify, at this moment for our outlook for the rest of the year in terms of the — our like a double-digit growth, right? And this is not taking into the consideration of the relaunch of the India. So that’s basically the — make it to the — basically, when we come out with guidance and outlook based on the current business, what we have seen for the existing kind of the trend of our current market for Free Fire.

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