SEGA parent company, SEGA Sammy Holdings, is about to close a deal to buy Rovio Entertainment, a company best known for making one of the earliest viral mobile games, Angry Birds.
According to The Wall Street Journal, SEGA is paying $1 billion to buy the Finnish video game company. Rovio and SEGA previously worked together to bring Sonic and the gang to Angry Birds Epic in 2015.
Angry Birds is a now-iconic physics puzzle game that swept the globe in 2009 and resulted in several sequels, spin-offs, tie-ins, and crossovers with known brands like Transformers, Star Wars, and more. Rovio also released an Angry Birds animated series and two feature films, the latter of which grossed over a total of $500 million at the global box office against a $138 million combined budget.
Unfortunately, Angry Birds’ success hasn’t seemed to have had a positive impact on Rovio’s other titles. On the other hand, SEGA hasn’t had much success in the mobile market either, which makes this a mutually beneficial acquisition.
The SEGA-Rovio deal is part of a growing trend of mobile game studio acquisitions in recent years. Just last year, Take-Two Interactive spent $12.7 billion to buy Zynga while part of the reason why Microsoft wants to buy Activision Blizzard is its mobile game division, which has produced hits like Candy Crush and Call of Duty Mobile, among others.
Neither SEGA nor Rovio has confirmed the details of the acquisition but we could hear more about it as early as next week.
In other SEGA news, the Japanese video game console manufacturer and publisher were among the latest to skip E3 2023, which was followed by the event’s official cancelation. SEGA is also being praised for its release of The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog, a “parody” game that’s since gone on to become one of the best-reviewed Steam games of all time. Finally, Sonic the Hedgehog 3 is set to hit theaters on December 20, 2024.
