The videogame giant has shown an interest in the casual gaming company PopCap Games, which has made popular casual games such as Bejeweled and Peggle, giving it a very large fanbase among gamers. On Tuesday, EA Games announced that they had agreed to buy PopCap games for a massive $750,000,000 in cash and stock. Yes, three quarters of a billion dollars.
PopCap Games has been in the industry since the year 2000, starting off with the gem-swapping game Bejweled which hit off with astounding success among gamers. Being bought by EA will be giving them a colossal boost. The terms of the deal are that EA will pay $650,000,000 cash and $100,000,000 in shares. If PopCap makes $91,000,000 in some earnings in the next two years, the current owners will get a $550,000,000 payout.
Holy crap all those numbers are making my head spin. When you actually think about how much a single company is worth in the space of a mere 11 years, you really start to realize how big the gaming industry is.
The deal is set to be finalized sometime in autumn, and EA will take over completely in 2013. EA however is not a company without large amounts of controversy and criticism over their services and the recent removal of Battlefield from Steam and a small amount of gamers are voicing some disapproval in fear that EA will ruin the IPs owned by PopCap. The large sum of money they are handing over however shows that they are very confident in this sale which is one of the largest I’ve seen recently.
