Games M&A hit another record this month, topping $25 billion to July 2016 with the $4.4 billion acquisition of Playtika by a Chinese consortium led by Giant. This is yet another sign of late stage market consolidation around mobile as overall games market growth slows and re balances between sectors.
The record was driven by a handful of major deals, including the $8.6 billion acquisition of 84.3% of Supercell by Tencent (at a $10.2 billion valuation), King‘s $5.9 billion acquisition by Activision-Blizzard (announced 2015, closed 2016) and the $1.8 billion M&A of Perfect World Entertainment by its listed film counterpart (after the games company delisted in 2015). Other substantial deals include the CMGE reverse merger in China (after its delisting from NASDAQ) and Vivendi’s acquisition of Gameloft.
This is a good sign for companies and gamers alike, as many media companies are contributing to game companies, which gives everyone a lot more money to work with.