Moon Active: The Israeli Company Behind Coin Master

Israeli Media, Entertainment & Gaming | Olam.business

Moon Active, founded in Tel Aviv in 2011 by Samuel Albin, built Coin Master into one of the highest-grossing mobile games in history, generating more than $6 billion in lifetime player spending on a single title and reaching a $5 billion valuation on a $300 million raise in 2021, without ever taking the company public.

What Is Moon Active?

Moon Active is a privately held Israeli mobile-gaming company, founded in Tel Aviv in 2011 by Samuel Albin, best known as the developer of Coin Master, a social slot-machine and village-building game that has generated more than $6 billion in lifetime revenue and remains one of the highest-grossing mobile games ever released.

At a Glance

Founded	2011, Tel Aviv, by Samuel Albin
Flagship game	Coin Master, released 2016: a slot-spin, village-building and raiding game combining social-casino mechanics with casual gameplay
Revenue scale	Coin Master generated over $1.2 billion annually from 2020 onward and crossed $6 billion in cumulative lifetime player spending by 2024
2021 funding round	Raised $300 million from Insight Partners and Andalusian Private Capital at a $5 billion valuation
Early investor	Gigi Levy-Weiss, the former 888 Holdings CEO, was an early angel investor and advisor on the company's monetization strategy
Melsoft acquisition	Acquired Belarus/Cyprus-based mobile studio Melsoft (maker of Family Island and My Cafe) for a reported 100 million dollars-plus in December 2020
Employees	Grew from roughly 650 (2020) to more than 1,300 (2021) to approximately 2,500 (2025), with major R&D centers in Tel Aviv and Kyiv
Ownership status	Remains privately held; no public listing or acquisition announced as of this writing

How Did Samuel Albin Build Coin Master?

Samuel Albin founded Moon Active in Tel Aviv in 2011, initially without the runaway hit that would come to define the company. Coin Master, released in 2016, combined a slot-machine spinning mechanic with village-building and a social "raiding" feature that let players attack and steal resources from friends' villages — a design that proved unusually effective at driving both engagement and monetization among a broad, largely non-gamer mobile audience. Early angel investor Gigi Levy-Weiss, the former CEO of 888 Holdings who has since built a career as an Israeli tech investor, is credited with contributing social-gaming and monetization expertise that shaped Coin Master's approach to high-spending "whale" players, connecting Moon Active to the same Israeli gambling-technology talent pool that produced 888, Playtech and Playtika.

The game's breakout moment came during the COVID-19 pandemic: Coin Master logged 15 million downloads in a single month (May 2020) as lockdowns drove mobile-gaming engagement worldwide, and the title generated $1.2 billion in 2020 alone, up 122% year over year from $539.6 million in 2019. Sensor Tower data placed Coin Master as the fourth-highest-grossing mobile game globally in 2020, and by 2024 the game had crossed $6 billion in cumulative lifetime player spending.

How Did Moon Active Expand and Raise Capital?

In December 2020, Moon Active acquired Melsoft, a mobile-game studio with roughly 240 employees based in Minsk, Belarus and Nicosia, Cyprus, and known for the titles Family Island and My Cafe, in a deal reported to be worth more than 100 million dollars. In November 2021, Moon Active raised 300 million dollars from Insight Partners — a continuing investor — and Andalusian Private Capital, at a valuation of approximately 5 billion dollars, with the company projecting 2021 revenue of 1.5 billion dollars. The company has continued to add titles, including Travel Town, a merge-puzzle game acquired in 2023, while conducting layoffs in late 2024 as growth in its legacy Coin Master franchise moderated.

Why Moon Active Matters to the Israeli Gaming Story

Moon Active sits alongside Playtika as one of the two dominant Israeli-founded companies in social and casual mobile gaming, but has taken the opposite path to scale: where Playtika moved through Caesars, a Chinese consortium, and a Nasdaq IPO, Moon Active has remained privately held throughout its history, financing growth through operating cash flow and a single late-stage venture round rather than a public listing or strategic sale. Coin Master's mechanics — the slot-spin core loop in particular — sit on the same design lineage as the social-casino genre Playtika pioneered with Slotomania, underscoring how much of Israel's mobile-gaming success has run through casino-adjacent mechanics even where the underlying games carry no real-money gambling license.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who founded Moon Active?

Samuel Albin founded Moon Active in Tel Aviv in 2011. The company remained privately held and largely under the radar until its flagship game, Coin Master, became a global hit starting in 2020.

How much has Coin Master earned?

Coin Master has generated more than 6 billion dollars in cumulative lifetime player spending as of 2024, with annual revenue exceeding 1.2 billion dollars in each year since 2020.

Is Moon Active a public company?

No. Moon Active remains privately held. It raised 300 million dollars from Insight Partners and Andalusian Private Capital in 2021 at a 5 billion dollar valuation, but has not pursued a public listing.

Is Moon Active tied to Israeli gambling-tech?

Early investor Gigi Levy-Weiss, the former CEO of 888 Holdings, contributed monetization expertise to Moon Active in its early years, linking the company to the same Israeli talent pool behind 888, Playtech and Playtika, even though Coin Master itself is a casual social game rather than a licensed gambling product.

מהי Moon Active?

Moon Active, שנוסדה בתל אביב ב-2011 בידי סמואל אלבין, הפכה את Coin Master לאחד המשחקים הרווחיים בעולם, עם למעלה מ-6 מיליארד דולר בהכנסות מצטברות. החברה גייסה 300 מיליון דולר ב-2021 לפי שווי של 5 מיליארד דולר, ונותרה חברה פרטית.

The Olam Editorial Team | Israeli Media, Entertainment & Gaming