Leaders, quiz it! or Interaction, all hybrid board games with app support, are familiar to fans of the scene in this country. Behind the titles is the Austrian startup Rudy Games. It is now broke, as can be seen from both media reports and information from the so-called credit protection association KSV1870. The reasons can be found in the persistently poor market situation, especially for small publishers.
Gertrude Kurzmann and Manfred Lamplmair founded Rudy Games in 2013. The goals were ambitious: develop parlor games with app support for the lowest possible entry hurdles. There were also technological approaches in recurring development phases to get even more out of the basic idea of hybrid board games. In the beginning it worked well - especially the debut title Leaders had a lot of fans in this country.
In Austria, too, things have been running for a while thanks to cooperation with the retail trade and thanks to a few business angels. For example, it successfully participated in the start-up show “2 Minutes 2 Million”, a format not dissimilar to the lion's den. Gertrude Kurzmann and Manfred Lamplmair were able to convince investors. Corona and the crisis market came recently. Both obviously affected the start-up a lot.
Rudy Games: No reorganization intended
Information can be found primarily on the portal of the credit protection association KSV1870. It is a creditor protection association that represents the interests of more than 30.000 voluntary members in Austria. The economically and politically independent association is comparable to the Schufa in Germany in some parts of the task.
It says literally about the type of insolvency "bankruptcy proceedings" about Rudy Games: "The company, founded in 2013, has due to an unstable earnings situation caused by the corona epidemic (Sic!) and problems with the development of the logistics structure in the toy market, which could not be absorbed, written negative numbers."
A positive continuation of the company is not possible, and no reorganization is sought. In short: Rudy Games is broke.
Particularly tragic: according to the platform, the bankruptcy proceedings were opened on December 14th, just before Christmas.
Even before the pandemic, in 2019, the mood at Rudy Games was significantly different with regard to the future: the number of players was right, half a million had been set as a goal at that time and 450.000 had already been reached. App and board games – that worked.
At the last games fair in Essen, Manfred Lamplmair sounded much less optimistic about the situation of small publishers in view of the past and current problems on the market: First the Corona and logistics crisis, now explosions in energy and consumer prices. According to the KSV, the liabilities of Rudy Games amounted to 1,1 million euros; Assets were 4.000 euros. It said 41 creditors were affected, but no employees.
* = Affiliate link/advertisementAs an Amazon Associate, we earn money from qualifying purchases. If you make a purchase through one of the links, we receive a portion of the purchase price as commission. This doesn't cost you anything extra, but it helps support our website. Last updated on September 13.05.2026, XNUMX / Affiliate links / Images from the Amazon Product Advertising API. Images from Amazon PA API.
