Japanese company Sega Sammy Holdings has offered 706 million euros (16.5 billion CZK) to take over Finnish company Rovio Entertainment, the creator of Angry Birds. The companies said in a joint press release today. The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported last week that Sega could pay about one billion dollars (CZK 21.2 billion) for Rovio.
Sega to offer 19% more per share
Sega will offer €9.25 per Rovio share. That’s up 19 percent from Friday’s closing price on the stock exchange.
Rovio announced in February that it had launched a review of the business, including discussions about its possible sale. The Finnish computer game developer earlier this year was in talks with Israeli rival Playtika Holding about a potential takeover. But those discussions ended last month without an agreement, the BBC reports.
Angry Birds was a pioneering mobile game released in 2009. In it, players use a slingshot to eject birds into the playing field and try to hit and disarm the green pigs, the thieves of their eggs. It became the first mobile game to surpass the one billion download mark. Last year, Rovio announced another milestone, five billion downloads across its entire catalogue of games.
Rovio sought to build on the success of the original game
Rovio sought to build on the success of the original game and released several sequels. A film has also been made. It went public at the end of 2017, hoping that this would help its plans for further growth. However, it failed to replicate the success of Angry Birds with further games. It became vulnerable to being taken over by one of its rival companies.
Newzoo BV said global consumer spending on mobile games fell 6.4 percent last year to $92.2 billion (CZK 1.96 trillion). Still, games account for about half of all game software sales, with the rest of the spending on games for consoles and PCs. The slowdown that followed the sharp rise in demand during the pandemic has contributed to a number of takeovers in the sector.
Source: Czech Press Office
