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It’s Official: EA’s Historic $55 Billion Sale Happens Next Week

Lunatic_Gamer

Lunatic_Gamer

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The era of Electronic Arts (EA) being a public company is coming to an end, and it will soon be under the control of a new ownership group.

In an SEC filing on Thursday, it was announced that EA has obtained every regulatory approval in order to move forward with it's sale to a consortium that includes the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund, Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners. With these approvals in place, the company expects to close the deal on Tuesday, August 4.

"Completion of the Merger remains subject to the satisfaction or waiver of the remaining customary closing conditions set forth in the Merger Agreement," the filing reads.

Upon completion of the acquisition, the PIF will own over 93% of the company. Andrew Wilson will remain on as CEO, and it will stay headquartered in Redwood City, California.

Source:
insider-gaming.com

Electronic Arts' $55 Billion Sale Set To Close Next Week

After gaining all regulatory approvals, the sale of Electronic Arts (EA) to the Saudi Arabia PIF is set to finally close.
insider-gaming.com insider-gaming.com

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On the positive note, Saudi are the good guys, this are not the Iranian regime or some islamic radicals. Very much a USA ally. We will not see any of those free palestine crap or kill Israel and USA.

We might see a decent BF map maybe of Hormuz, Karg island, Iraq, Yemen, and Iran in Bf6.
 
neocycle said:
What will we lose this time?
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I mean what has EA released in the past fifteen years? They stopped becoming a developer/publisher after BF 4 and became a gacha games company.

I'm more curious what this sale actually does in the grand scheme of things. I seriously doubt we'll see another Alice game or a resurrection of the back catalog that's just sitting there. It's really amazing looking back at the company they were during the PS2-Era
 
Everyone will be doom and gloom about this and let's face it you will be right to think so.

But a potential silver lining could be that this makes EA less risk adverse and green light some games from the gold mine of forgotten IP they own.

How EA never green lit a Wing Commander / Privateer game after they witnessed Star Citizen whales I have no idea.
 
Ovek said:
Everyone will be doom and gloom about this and let's face it you will be right to think so.

But a potential silver lining could be that this makes EA less risk adverse and green light some games from the gold mine of forgotten IP they own.

How EA never green lit a Wing Commander / Privateer game after they witnessed Star Citizen whales I have no idea.
Click to expand...
Think about the fact this entire company is raking in billions hand over foot from mobile gacha games and sports games that are borderline slot machines and a Battlefield game every 3 years.

In the grand scheme of things the cost / benefit analysis will always be towards non-stop recurring revenue. This mindset destroyed the entire generation for Sony and they aren't the company that ripped me away from Xbox anymore.
 
yogaflame said:
On the positive note, Saudi are the good guys, this are not the Iranian regime or some islamic radicals. Very much a USA ally. We will not see any of those free palestine crap or kill Israel and USA.

We might see a decent BF map maybe of Hormuz, Karg island, Iraq, Yemen, and Iran in Bf6.
Click to expand...

Yep, that Saudi, Osama Bin Laden was just misunderstood 🤷‍♂️
 
Puscifer said:
I mean what has EA released in the past fifteen years? They stopped becoming a developer/publisher after BF 4 and became a gacha games company.

I'm more curious what this sale actually does in the grand scheme of things. I seriously doubt we'll see another Alice game or a resurrection of the back catalog that's just sitting there. It's really amazing looking back at the company they were during the PS2-Era
Click to expand...
This sale will ensure that nothing will be released except for the most profitable GaaS games.

The Nu-EA will be settled with over $20 billion debt burden as the result of the usual private equity shenanigans.
 
yogaflame said:
On the positive note, Saudi are the good guys, this are not the Iranian regime or some islamic radicals. Very much a USA ally. We will not see any of those free palestine crap or kill Israel and USA.

We might see a decent BF map maybe of Hormuz, Karg island, Iraq, Yemen, and Iran in Bf6.
Click to expand...

Ah, yes. The state that executes people for political dissent, assassinates journalists and has practically no concept of free speech are the "good guys" 👍

Honestly, yes they may be better than most states in the area, they're not what I would call good guys.

yogaflame said:
Yehey no more SBI, rainbow and pride agenda crap.
Click to expand...

I'm afraid you may be disappointed. Although they do have a lot of power, they're not the only investors (Silver Lake and Affinity Partners are the other two) in EA.

However, the truth is they probably just don't care. They'll leave the leave running of the company to the existing executives and developers. Their only concern is to get a quick return on the money they invested.

Don't expect a new Need for Speed or Road Rash etc. A return of investment is their goal now, so expect EA to find more creative ways to bleed money out of customers.
 
Stuart360 said:
Remember the days when EA would release a wide range of different games in different genre's?. Those times have long gone.

Nothing is really lost here.
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they all used to. EA, XBOX, Playstation, Ubisoft all had a huge diverse slate of all sorts of genres. Plus Playstation had all their crappy Japan slop they would publish.
 
The amount of micro transactions in their games are going to go through the roof lol. Leveraged buyout of about $20 billion they have to make up.
 
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I know this isn't going to result in much good.

I also know that this is making the purple place, blue sky, and reddit cry and collectively crash the fuck out.

I am so conflicted.
 
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Its in better hands soon. EA has been trash with their woke driven agenda.

Even if you don't like the idea of Saudis controlling EA but think of it like siding with the lesser evils.
 
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Puscifer said:
I mean what has EA released in the past fifteen years? They stopped becoming a developer/publisher after BF 4 and became a gacha games company.

I'm more curious what this sale actually does in the grand scheme of things. I seriously doubt we'll see another Alice game or a resurrection of the back catalog that's just sitting there. It's really amazing looking back at the company they were during the PS2-Era
Click to expand...
Alice, Dead Space, more Jedi, and proper Dragon Age games without any activist bullshit is all I want. We'll see if the Saudis can do better than American/Canadian troons and male feminists.

If it's just more of the same, then it won't really change my opinion on EA much.
 
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EA already hit rock bottom with their DEI slop and LGBTQ propaganda, so it only goes up from here.

The purge is going to be glorious. They'll surely get rid of these DEI hires and consultants, and those cosplayers in the office playing pretending to be women. Love to see it.
 
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Ovek said:
Everyone will be doom and gloom about this and let's face it you will be right to think so.

But a potential silver lining could be that this makes EA less risk adverse and green light some games from the gold mine of forgotten IP they own.

How EA never green lit a Wing Commander / Privateer game after they witnessed Star Citizen whales I have no idea.
Click to expand...
I doubt we'll EVER get a remaster of those games, (Wing Commander) out of curiosity it would be good if Wing Commander 2 for the SNES was finally released to the public to see what could have been, some say it was near enough finished but pulled from getting released...
 
If i told you in 2020 that out of the three big publishers (ea, acti and ubi), Ubisoft would be the last man standing, would you have believed that?
 
IDKFA said:
Ah, yes. The state that executes people for political dissent, assassinates journalists and has practically no concept of free speech are the "good guys" 👍

Honestly, yes they may be better than most states in the area, they're not what I would call good guys.
Click to expand...

"[Saudi Arabia] may be a son of a bitch, but he's our son of a bitch."

I don't care if this is good or bad, I care that fans of The Sims are angry. I love those games but its fans have been weirdos about it since the 90s.

simpatico said:
EA has had this coming since they fucked over Origin Systems and then had the audacity to call their slop launcher Origin. Justice is served.
Click to expand...

 
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Not gonna lie, going private might be the best idea EA has had in over a decade.
Don't get me wrong, I don't think they're suddenly gonna become the Second Coming of VALVe. But it's a minuscule step in the right direction.
 
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