Rovio, the company behind the insanely successful Angry Birds mobile game, is being snapped up by Sega, it has been confirmed (thanks, BBC).
Sega Sammy Holdings will pay €706m (£625m / $776m) in the deal, with talks being confirmed at the weekend. When trading closed on Friday, Rovio's stock market value was $707m (£571m).
Rovio's most famous product, Angry Birds, launched in 2009 and is reported to be the first mobile game to pass a billion downloads. It has spawned sequels, merchandise and two Hollywood movies – but Rovio has struggled to recreate the same impact with any of its other titles, which led to talk of a sale materialising.
Rovio – which has around 550 staff worldwide – announced earlier this year that it was reviewing its business and had held talks over selling up to a larger entity. Israeli rival Playtika emerged as a potential buyer, but talks came to nothing.
Angry Birds wasn't solely confined to mobile – it also saw several console releases, including Angry Birds Trilogy, Angry Birds: Star Wars and Angry Birds VR: Isle of Pigs.
[source bbc.co.uk]
Comments 7
I dunno if this is a good or bad sign.
Angry Birds Sonic edition incoming. I'll be honest I didn't even realise they were still making Angry Birds games. They really must still be raking it in over those games to have that kind of value.
remember when the big hype was that angry birds was the new mario, and kids didnt even care about mario anymore really?
lol.
@RetroGames I would say good. This puts a very well known IP under Sega's belt, expands the capabilities of their Europe branch, brings in nearly 500+ well trained developers, and gives them a notable increase in the mobile marketplace. It's also possible that Sega would try to fix some of the PR shipwrecks Rovio has been making in the last year or so.
@Zenszulu By some accounts, the deal would buy for itself in as little as two years.
@NatiaAdamo I have no doubt about that and Sega as they are now seem very good at buying up developers/publishers the focus just on one kind of game type and market.
@Zenszulu Indeed. Outside of Atlus, nearly all Sega studios that have been bought since the Sega Sammy Merger in 2004 are in Sega of Europe's handling. (Rovio is planned to become part of SoE, according to the documents)
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