PlayStation Makes 5% Investment in Devolver Digital - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 05 November 2021 / 3,612 Views
Devolver Digital this week announced it had acquired Enter the Gungeon developer Dodge Roll, Reigns and Card Shark developer Nerial, and Stronghold developer Firefly Studios, as well as becoming a publicly traded company. The employees at the company have remained the majority owners.
GamesIndustry is reporting Sony Interactive Entertainment will be making a five percent investment in Devolver Digital.
The US-based publisher began trading on AIM, a sub-market London Stock Exchange, and has been valued at close to $1 billion. It makes it the largest ever US-based company by market capitalization to be admitted to the London Stock Exchange.
"An IPO is the right choice for us to ensure our continued growth and support even more wonderful games," said Devolver Digital CEO Douglas Morin. "Most importantly, it will allow us to retain our culture.
"Being a public company gives liquidity to our amazing team, all of whom are shareholders. It also gives us access to capital markets to continue investing in our growth strategy and talent."
Devolver Digital was founded in 2009 and is headquartered in Austin, Texas and London, UK.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel dedicated to gaming Let's Plays and tutorials. You can contact the author at wdangelo@vgchartz.com or on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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Well that will give them some voice over the company, let`s see what comes out of it.
Ah Sony will get Devolver to ask From Soft to port Otogi after they did Metal Wolf right? right?! Please! Otogi games are awesome!
Such a crude company.
Curious. I wonder what Sony is seeing in this.
got there foot in the door now.. i know they are not AAA but they have made some decent games
This a weird move from sony couldve been 20% at least 5 is so tiny haha
5% could make them the largest shareholder. I'm certain they are one of the largest. But, I don't know how devolver has structured their stock. There may be multiple classes of shares, and Sony could be purchasing a class that has more or less voting rights than other classes. So, the 5% number in and of itself doesn't tell us very much.
NetEase is the largest with 9%. However, Sony has a very close relationship with them especially since Shu took over the Indy side of the company which explains the exclusivity deal with Fall Guys. So I am not surprised Sony invested in DD.
This is just one in a string of strategic investments that Sony have made where they have taken around the 5% range . and it isn't the first one involving NetEase, basically they have mainly been based around investment opportunities coming from gaming companies looking for capital raising an example being their second investment in Epic that came about from a capital raising venture where they doubled their investment but didn't take up all the allocated shares, the strategy works in a number of ways , the usual return on investment side as well as closer ties with these players while also helping those players expand and be financially secure, so lessening the chance of a take over.
Yep even more since on the article it says most of the stock have been kept by employees, so if Sony wants to increase their part they will need to buy from the employees probably.
Sony now own 2.1% of Epic, 1.9% Kadokawa, 4.98% Billibilli and now 5% Devolver Digital. There's obviously a strategy in having a small investment in all of these companies that align with them.
That kind of thing often happens because those other companies need a cash infusion for something, and Sony has a vested interest in their survival. So, they give them that cash and get a piece of the business.
To be clear, I have no inside knowledge of this, nor do I know much about the inner workings of the video game industry in particular. But, I do understand business in general very well, and things like this in many industries often go the way I just laid out.
Also, from a pure nvestment perspective, Sony has a lot of inside information about the video game industry. It can make sense to invest when you have better information than most people.
Yep your point even though as you said is little generic is totally within the realm of reason and possibility.
