{"id":20299,"date":"2025-10-01T14:38:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-01T12:38:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2025\/10\/01\/why-the-enormous-saudi-led-deal-to-acquire-ea-matters-whether-you-play-games-or-not\/"},"modified":"2025-10-01T14:38:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-01T12:38:10","slug":"why-the-enormous-saudi-led-deal-to-acquire-ea-matters-whether-you-play-games-or-not","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2025\/10\/01\/why-the-enormous-saudi-led-deal-to-acquire-ea-matters-whether-you-play-games-or-not\/","title":{"rendered":"Why the enormous Saudi-led deal to acquire EA matters, whether you play games or not"},"content":{"rendered":"

In this week\u2019s newsletter: The private equity effort to acquire the makers of Fifa and more is the biggest deal in gaming history \u2013 financially and morally<\/p>\n

When Microsoft announced its intention to buy Activision-Blizzard for a touch over $68bn in 2022, it was the biggest deal ever struck in the games industry, and one of the most surprising. But that shock pales into comparison to the reaction to the latest big move in the industry: EA (Electronic Arts), the publisher best known for its juggernaut sports games Madden and EA Sports FC (previously called Fifa), is being taken private<\/a> in the \u201cbiggest leveraged buyout in history\u201d. It\u2019s a deal worth $55bn, by a trio of investors who, on paper, look like a collection of end-of-level bosses.<\/p>\n

Enter player one: Saudi Arabia\u2019s sovereign wealth fund. The Saudi royal family has been investing its wealth in video games for some years now, and owns its own Savvy Games Group, led by crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, perhaps best known for mass-arresting his own citizens and ordering the assassination of<\/a> journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Player two: Affinity Partners, an investment company led by Jared Kushner<\/a>, son-in-law of the current US president. And player three: Silver Lake<\/a>, just your run-of-the-mill evil private equity firm, which currently owns a large stake in game engine-maker Unity. Game File\u2019s Stephen Totilo noticed that Affinity Partners\u2019 logo is a mirror image<\/a> of that used by the evil corporation in the Assassin\u2019s Creed series. Truly you couldn\u2019t make this stuff up.<\/p>\n

Continue reading…<\/a>
\nIn this week\u2019s newsletter: The private equity effort to acquire the makers of Fifa and more is the biggest deal in gaming history \u2013 financially and morally
\nWhen Microsoft announced its intention to buy Activision-Blizzard for a touch over $68bn in 2022, it was the biggest deal ever struck in the games industry, and one of the most surprising. But that shock pales into comparison to the reaction to the latest big move in the industry: EA (Electronic Arts), the publisher best known for its juggernaut sports games Madden and EA Sports FC (previously called Fifa), is being taken private in the \u201cbiggest leveraged buyout in history\u201d. It\u2019s a deal worth $55bn, by a trio of investors who, on paper, look like a collection of end-of-level bosses.
\nEnter player one: Saudi Arabia\u2019s sovereign wealth fund. The Saudi royal family has been investing its wealth in video games for some years now, and owns its own Savvy Games Group, led by crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, perhaps best known for mass-arresting his own citizens and ordering the assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Player two: Affinity Partners, an investment company led by Jared Kushner, son-in-law of the current US president. And player three: Silver Lake, just your run-of-the-mill evil private equity firm, which currently owns a large stake in game engine-maker Unity. Game File\u2019s Stephen Totilo noticed that Affinity Partners\u2019 logo is a mirror image of that used by the evil corporation in the Assassin\u2019s Creed series. Truly you couldn\u2019t make this stuff up. Continue reading…Technology | The Guardian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In this week\u2019s newsletter: The private equity effort to acquire the makers of Fifa and more is the biggest deal in gaming history \u2013 financially and morally When Microsoft announced its intention to buy Activision-Blizzard for a touch over $68bn in 2022, it was the biggest deal ever struck in the games industry, and one …<\/p>\n

Why the enormous Saudi-led deal to acquire EA matters, whether you play games or not<\/span> Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":20300,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20299"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20299"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20299\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}