Mindtail

About Mindtail

Based in Istanbul, Turkey, Mindtail is a mobile gaming studio founded in 2025 by R. Tamer Özgen (CEO), Umut Yıldız, Sarper Karabağ, and Doğuşcan Öztürk. The founding team possesses extensive experience from key roles in product, growth, and development at prominent mobile gaming companies such as Dream Games, King, Tactile Games, Ace Games, and Codeway. Their collective portfolio includes work on highly successful titles like Royal Match, Candy Crush Soda Saga, Lily's Garden, and the Braindom series, which have reached hundreds of millions of players globally. Mindtail focuses on the development of hybrid casual puzzle games, leveraging what it terms an "AI-native production model." This approach integrates artificial intelligence and next-generation tools into the core production workflow to significantly reduce development cycles from months to weeks. The company's strategy is to combine the team's proven expertise in creating hit games with a technology-forward development process to achieve high-quality experiences with greater velocity. The business model is centered on creating engaging, free-to-play mobile games for the global market, with revenue likely generated through in-app purchases and advertising. In May 2026, Mindtail announced it had secured $2 million in a pre-seed funding round. The round was led by APY Ventures with participation from Inveo Ventures and Ak Portföy GSYF. The capital is allocated towards expanding the development team, enhancing its AI-based production infrastructure, and conducting initial marketing tests. Following the investment, the company plans to triple its team size in the short term, with its first game announcement anticipated soon. Keywords: mobile gaming, hybrid casual games, puzzle games, AI-native production, game development, Istanbul startup, R. Tamer Özgen, Umut Yıldız, Sarper Karabağ, Doğuşcan Öztürk, Royal Match, Candy Crush, Lily's Garden, Dream Games, King, venture capital, pre-seed funding, APY Ventures, Inveo Ventures, AI in gaming, free-to-play, mobile entertainment, gaming studio, tech-forward development