March has rolled around, and for our gaming team, that means only one thing: Game Developers Conference 2025.
With nearly 30,000 attendees, over 300 exhibitors and more than 700 lectures, panels and roundtable discussions, GDC 2025 will draw in the global gaming industry for its annual gathering at the Moscone Center, San Francisco.
To get us ready, we sat down with the team who will be representing servers.com to find out what this event means to them, their top predictions, and why the excitement for this year in particular is so high.
For our team, there is one standout reason why they’re so excited for GDC 2025: the servers.com booth.
“Something we realised towards the end of last year’s GDC was a lack of anywhere central in the expo to hold many meetings” says Jarrod Palmer, Head of Gaming. “So, we thought this year would be a great opportunity to not only create the biggest servers.com booth yet, but to place it front and center of the expo and use it as a meeting space for everyone at the event to use.”
For Isaac Douglas, Chief Revenue Officer, the booth is all about expanding – and giving back to – the global gaming community:
“We do a lot of business in video gaming. Alongside our other verticals, gaming has been a big part of our success in growing the company, and for GDC 2025, our aim is to give something back” explains Isaac. “Whether a company is speaking to us or not, we want to provide them a space to have meetings and do business, and we’ll be on hand for anything they might need, even if it’s just a coffee.”
You can find our booth at hall location S527.
To book a meeting lounge spot at our booth, you can do so via the GDC event app – full instructions can be found on the servers.com GDC portal. But be quick – spaces are filling up fast!
“Whether a company is speaking to us or not, we want to provide them a space to have meetings and do business.”
Over the years, we’ve learned that our attendance at events such as GDC and Gamescom isn’t just about us. Simply put, our presence at these gaming events wouldn’t be complete without our partners who join us on our booth.
Every corner of our booth will feature a partner we work closely with to bring high performing dedicated servers to gamers. Nitrado, Nodecraft, Gameye, Shockbyte and Photon Engine are all returning to our booth for GDC 2025, creating a hub of diverse expertise from the managed hosting space.
“It shows our commitment to creating a thriving gaming ecosystem”, says Ilya Sokolov, EVP Product and Engineering. “By featuring our partners at our booth corners, we demonstrate real-world implementations of our infrastructure solutions, while providing visitors with an understanding of how our services support diverse gaming workloads.”
“Not every studio has the budget, skill or desire to manage their infrastructure themselves” continues Jarrod. “We’re banging the drum of what’s best for the developer, and if that means not using us directly, but using our product by going through one of the managed providers we partner with, that’s exactly what we want to see as well.”
But this year, we are taking it one step further – hosting a GDC panel, where Andreas Pohl of Nitrado, Sebastiaan Heijne of Gameye, Scott Chapman of Unity and Larry Rye of Rocket Science Group will be joining Jarrod on stage to share their expert advice on how to begin the hosting journey for a multiplayer game.
You can learn more about the panel, titled ‘How to Choose the Perfect Server Hosting Setup for your Multiplayer Game’, on the GDC schedule, here.
“Every game is different,” explains Charlie Bowers, Gaming Specialist. “There’s no one-size-fits-all, and there’s a vast array of proven success from the five unique partners on our booth that you can work with, without having to blow your budget to do so.
“Our booth to me is a real reminder of what can be achieved when you open a discussion between us and our partners, such as talking about cost savings in what is a challenging time for the industry.”
“By featuring our partners at our booth corners, we demonstrate real-world implementations of our infrastructure solutions, while providing visitors with an understanding of how our services support diverse gaming workloads.”
Every year at GDC there is a new buzzword. Whether it be cross platform gaming, VR or NFTs, some are done with and forgotten about within the year. But others stand the test of time.
One such example is a topic that, unfortunately, is returning after many had hoped would disappear by 2025 – the cost management challenge for game studios.
Last year, a survey conducted by GDC found that a shocking 35% of developers were affected by layoffs last year, with 7% of respondents losing their jobs. Budget, and the conversation around how to optimize costs, is a topic many are predicting will be front and center at this year’s GDC as well.
“There were many job losses through 2024 due to a difficulty in gaining investment, spending caps and tighter budgets” says Charlie. “The refrain ‘Survive to ’25’ acknowledged that, in the hopes that come this year, things would be on the up. But instead, the message has evolved to ‘Survive 25’.”
It’s for this reason that Jarrod feels a level of responsibility to educate game studios in what they can do to mitigate these challenges:
“What we want to do at GDC is to educate the industry; a large overhead for every developer is infrastructure spend, and if 100% of your infrastructure is currently on the cloud, there are very easy ways to optimize your costs.
“It doesn’t need to be 100% bare metal, either. Just introducing bare metal for your baseline CCU (concurrent users) while using cloud’s scaling capabilities means you’ll have a hybrid infrastructure that will keep your game servers performing for a fraction of the cost.
“These are the conversations I think we’ll be having even more of at GDC. It’s really tough to see, as everyone knows someone who has been affected by these budget cuts, so we’re trying to mitigate that from the start through smarter hosting choices.”
Our Gaming Specialists are on the front line of conversation. For Charlie and Gavin, their work is all about opening doors. But what is most important for them is that they do it the right way: building connections, understanding developers’ needs, and ultimately sharing their love for gaming.
“It’s always very relaxed at our booth” says Gavin Budd, Gaming Specialist. “We’ve got our famous coffee, as well as our new ‘happy hour’ slushies; the booth is always about providing the industry a space to chill out. To think that this year, we’ll be extending our booth with a dedicated meeting lounge for anyone to use, is incredibly exciting.”
Jarrod sees our GDC 2025 booth as the perfect metaphor for how we like to do business:
“The public space on our booth is a great reflection for what we’re trying to achieve at servers.com, which is transparent business. There’s no sleazy pitch - it’s always ‘this is what we offer, this is how it’ll help you, and let’s have a chat.’ But if it doesn’t work for you, that is absolutely fine, and we are always here if you need any help.”
And for Charlie, catching up with our customers and partners is just as important as saying hello to new faces:
“GDC for me is all about having a good time. Whether that’s working at the expo with all our meetings with potential customers or catching up with friends I have made in the industry over the years. We always make really good memories in San Francisco that I’ll genuinely cherish for the rest of my life, and I’m looking forward to making more.”
“The public space on our booth is a great reflection for what we’re trying to achieve at servers.com, which is transparent business. There’s no sleazy pitch - it’s always ‘this is what we offer, this is how it’ll help you, and let’s have a chat.”
“I’m just really excited” concludes Isaac, looking back on his previous trips to San Francisco.
“I’ve been going to GDC for thirteen years now, and I remember walking around the exhibition center all those years ago, looking at the big companies with their booths thinking ‘I’m never going to be in that position’. And to finally be there with the space we’ve got, will not only be a hugely successful part of my career, but ultimately for everyone who has made the servers.com presence at GDC 2025 what it is.”
Joining us for GDC 2025? Guarantee a spot at our meeting lounge by booking a time through the GDC app. Full instructions can be found here – we’re looking forward to meeting you!
