Jest Launches the World's First Marketplace for Messaging Games With $7M Seed Round and Developer Fund

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SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb 26, 2026--

Jest, the company building the world’s first marketplace for messaging games, today announced it has emerged from stealth with $7 million in seed funding led by Innovation Endeavors. The company is also announcing its Jest Games Fund, which offers up to $1 million per title, to accelerate the ecosystem and help developers build the next generation of instant, high-retention titles.

Driven by the rapid global adoption of RCS, Jest uses messaging as a frictionless distribution channel - positioning it as the first viable challenger to the mobile app store monopoly. Early partners developing for the platform include leading studios such as Pocket Gems (Episode), Global Worldwide (Kingdom Maker), HayHay (Puppy Mansion), Nowwa (Super Snappy Go), HG Point (Piece of Cake), and Dominion Games (Opps).

Meet the World’s First Marketplace for Messaging Games

Jest will use its seed funding to scale the platform and onboard the first wave of studios. The company is capitalizing on three massive industry shifts:

• Conversational Interfaces Go Mainstream - Messaging is no longer just communication - it’s an interface. From ChatGPT to customer support bots, users have grown accustomed to interacting with technology through chat. Jest builds on this shift by enabling players to discover, play, and stay connected to their favorite games through a conversational surface.
• The Shift to Instant Experiences - Modern smartphones, faster 5G networks, and mature web technologies have removed the need for traditional app installs. Players increasingly expect experiences that launch instantly, without downloads or storage costs - making instant, no-install games a natural evolution of mobile gaming.
• The Rise of RCS - RCS is now enabled by default across both Android and iOS, turning the smartphone messaging inbox into a rich, interactive surface. Unlike push notifications - limited in format, length, and interactivity - RCS supports persistent, app-like experiences inside a conversation, dramatically expanding what developers can build and how users engage.

"As millions of mobile apps and games compete for new users amid a decline in app store downloads and soaring acquisition costs, it’s increasingly clear that the app store business model is outdated. Messaging is the first open, global distribution channel to offer developers a fundamentally new distribution and engagement model," said Deyan Vitanov, CEO and Co-Founder of Jest. “Messaging fundamentally reshapes the retention curve by meeting players where they already are - in their text threads.”

The RCS Inflection Point

With Apple’s adoption of RCS in iOS 18 in late 2024, messaging reached a long-awaited inflection point: a single, universal standard capable of supporting rich, app-like experiences across platforms. RCS introduces native support for branding, verified identities, images, buttons, and structured content.

Together, these capabilities enable a new class of instant, app-less experiences that live directly inside messaging threads - without downloads or app stores. As RCS adoption accelerates past 3.8 billion monthly active users, these experiences can now scale across platforms for the first time.

Jest is the first platform purpose-built to capitalize on this infrastructure shift. Results already reflect its impact, with partner titles delivering 3-4x higher retention and 35-60% lower UA costs than their mobile app versions across 1M+ games played in beta.

The Jest Games Fund

To seed the next generation of iconic messaging games, Jest is introducing the Jest Games Fund. The fund is designed to support both indie and established studios in building, launching, and scaling messaging game titles, including the adaptation of existing IP for the Jest platform.

The Jest Games Fund supports studios at every stage of franchise development on the Jest platform and has begun deploying $1M for flagship, $200K for promising, and $40K for exploratory titles.

Key benefits for developers building on Jest include:

• Instant Reach: Messaging games launch instantly - no downloads, no waiting, and no friction between discovery and play.
• Keep 90% of Revenue: Developers keep 90% of revenue on Jest, with the platform subsidizing 100% of messaging costs - compared to the 30%+ fees and added distribution costs typical of app stores.
• Easy to Build: Jest’s SDK turns messaging into a simple API call, handling infrastructure, carrier integrations, compliance, and liability so teams can focus on building great games.

“Every major gaming platform has been defined by a new distribution surface,” said Dror Berman, Founder and Managing Partner at Innovation Endeavors. “Jest is opening a new one inside messaging, giving developers direct access to global audiences beyond the app store model.”

To learn more about Jest, its seed funding, and the Jest Games Fund, please visit https://about.jest.com/.

About Jest

Founded in 2025, Jest is building the first marketplace for messaging games, creating a new way for developers to reach players instantly through the world’s most familiar communication surface. Built for the texting era, Jest enables frictionless, no-download gameplay designed for high retention and scale.

View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260225524544/en/

CONTACT: Media Contact

Max Lifton

VSC for Jest

[email protected]

KEYWORD: CALIFORNIA UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA

INDUSTRY KEYWORD: ENTERTAINMENT CONSUMER ELECTRONICS APPS/APPLICATIONS TECHNOLOGY GENERAL ENTERTAINMENT SOFTWARE ELECTRONIC GAMES

SOURCE: Jest

Copyright Business Wire 2026.

PUB: 02/26/2026 11:00 AM/DISC: 02/26/2026 11:00 AM

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