Electronic Arts has finally found a buyer worth courting. According to the Wall Street Journal a group of private equity investors including Silver Lake and the Saudi Public Investment Fund is lining up a $50 leveraged buyout to take the developer/publisher of the Madden NFL, The Sims, Battlefield, and Mass Effect series off the public stock market.
Sources familiar with the transaction informed the Journal that the deal could be announced as soon as next week. EA shares shot up 14 percent to $193 per share shortly after the revelation was made public. As the Journal notes, a $50 billion leveraged buyout would be the largest transaction of its kind of all time.
The acquisition would follow two years of mass layoffs and studio closures seemingly triggered by the underperformance of EA Sports FC 25 and Dragon Age: The Veilguard.
Rumors of another company acquiring EA last circled in 2022. In 2023 the PIF increased its investment in EA to roughly 25 million shares, then about 9.4 percent of the California-based publisher. Since then it’s expanded its investments in a number of video game developers and publishers and outright purchased free-to-play publisher Scopely that same year.
The Saudi PIF is a state-backed organization chaired by the crown prince
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Developers have criticized the PIF’s increasing investment in the video game industry over its role as a state-backed organization chaired by the crown prince Mohammad bin Salman Al-Saud (MBS).
The Saudi government has been criticized for its poor human rights record, particularly in its continued repression of rights for women and members of the LGBTQ community. The government has also been accused of torturing and murdering activists and dissidents, with the crown prince himself implicated in ordering the murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi.
Game Developer has reached out to EA for comment and will issue a response when this story is updated.