A division of Sony Group Corp. has agreed to purchase 100% of the shares of Bungie Inc., an independent video game developer, for $3.6 billion, Sony announced on Monday (Jan. 31).
Bungie, based in Washington state, has been a Sony collaborator for many years and has developed some of the video game industry’s most popular franchises, including Halo and Destiny, Sony said.
The acquisition provides PlayStation maker Sony Interactive Entertainment LLC with access to Bungie’s approach to live game services and technology. The deal is intended to further Sony’s mission to reach billions of players. Bungie will continue to operate as an independent company with the ability to debut new games and reach players everywhere, Sony added.
Bungie, with more than 900 employees, is focused on the long-term development of Destiny 2, the free online-only multiplayer first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie. It was originally released as a pay to play game in 2017 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Microsoft Windows platforms.
“This is an important step in our strategy to expand the reach of PlayStation to a much wider audience,” said Jim Ryan, president and CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment, in a statement.
The deal comes two weeks after Microsoft Corp. announced its plan to acquire Activision Blizzard, the American video game holding company based in Santa Monica, California.
Read more: Microsoft’s $70B Bid for Video Game Maker May Test Market Definitions
Under the terms of the deal, Microsoft will acquire Activision Blizzard for $95.00 per share, in an all-cash transaction valued at $68.7 billion. The transaction is expected to accelerate the growth of Microsoft’s gaming business across mobile, PC, console and cloud and provide building blocks for the metaverse.
Video games are a multi-billion-dollar business. In 2020, revenue from the worldwide PC gaming market was estimated at almost $37 billion in the U.S. and the mobile gaming market generated an estimated income of over $77 billion, according to Statista.
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