For the company Playtika, known for numerous social and mobile games in the genre of slots, the Chinese consortium agreed to pay an amount of $ 4.4 billion.
The year of high-profile mergers and acquisitions continues. Last Sunday, July 31, it became known that Caesars Entertainment Corporation, an American gambling giant that manages more than 50 real casinos and hotels, is acquiring Playtika for $4.4 billion.
Playtika is currently one of the largest companies developing and publishing social and mobile games. Only in the American box office Top 100 games are four of her games (iOS, iPhone):
- Slotomania Free Slots Casino Games (7th place);
- World Series of Poker (18th place);
- Slots Caesars Casino (46th place);
- BINGO Blitz (73rd place).
According to the results of last June, its Slotomania was recognized as the highest-grossing game on social platforms, surpassing games such as Candy Crush Saga and FarmVille 2. The total DAU of the company’s games is 6 million. Its quarterly revenues are estimated at $240 million.
The buyer of Playtika was not the South Korean Netmarble Games, which was previously ready to shell out an amount from $3.4 billion to $4.3 billion, but a whole group of mostly non-core Chinese companies, including:
- Giant Network Technology (MMORPG operator);
- Yunfeng Capital (Alibaba founder’s investment firm);
- China Oceanwide (real estate company);
- China Minsheng Trust Co (non-bank credit institution);
- CDH China (Financial Asset Management Organization);
- Hony Capital (investment company).
Under the terms of the deal, which will be closed this year, Playtika will continue to operate as an independent company. Its headquarters will remain in Herzliya (Israel). Playtika also has studios and offices in Australia, Argentina, Belarus, Ukraine, Canada, Romania, the USA and Japan.
Fun fact: Caesars Entertainment Corporation acquired Playtika in 2011 for $80-90 million. Now Caesars is selling it due to economic difficulties related to the core business.
Sources: Bloomberg, VentureBeat