The rumors are confirmed: the Japanese video game publisher Sega announced Monday, April 17 the next acquisition of the Finnish Rovio Entertainment, originally mobile games Angry Birds. An acquisition at 706 million euros as much to increase its share of the mobile game market as to release ever more derivative products.
It’s confirmed: SEGA is going to buy Rovio, the independent publisher of Angry Birds mobile games since 2009. In a press release published on Monday April 17, 2023, the Japanese company corroborated the rumors by announcing to acquire the Finnish company approximately 706 million euros.
Relying almost entirely on the revenues of Angry Birds for 14 years, Rovio has nevertheless shown signs of economic weakness since 2015. SEGA is therefore getting its hands on this game for smartphones which has generated 800 million dollars in turnover since its creation, according to the daily The echoeswhile also wanting to boost its own mobile titles.
More mobile games and merchandise
In the press release dedicated to the takeover, the former glory of Japanese video games sets out three specific objectives for this takeover. First, SEGA confirms the most obvious: use Rovio’s recognizable expertise in operating online mobile games, to bring current and new SEGA titles to the global mobile games market “.
In particular, the publisher intends to take advantage of Rovio’s Beacon platform, dedicated to managing and monetizing mobile games-services. But above all, SEGA states in its second objective that the company will help Rovio to extend its licenses ” outside of mobile gaming and cross-platform.
Finally, the third point evokes the sharing of their respective know-how concerning ” multimedia expansion» characters from their video games, SEGA citing the box office successes of the films angry Birds (2016 then 2019) and sonic (2020 and 2022).
Given the current success of Super Mario Bros, the moviebased on the characters of its eternal competitor Nintendo, we understand that the other Japanese company wishes to continue betting on this merchandising video game characters.
A consolidating market
SEGA therefore explicitly announces the color: the takeover of Rovio seeks to “boost user engagement with cross-platform support and improved media mix“. Clearly, keep its customers by diversifying its presence on different media and supports, especially on smartphones.
In this same document, SEGA also points out that the average annual growth rate ofmobile gamingshould increase by 5% and represent 56% of total worldwide video game revenues by 2026. But these figures say nothing about another reality of this market: for the first time since the arrival of smartphones, this market fell by 6% in 2022, according tonewzoo.
A first sign of instability which is accompanied by a reduction in the number of players in this market, notesThe echoes: after the acquisition of Zynga (farmville) by the giant Take-Two Interactive in 2022, Microsoft is currently trying to buy the publisher Activision-Blizzard (Candy Crush Saga). If SEGA wantsstrengthen its position in this marketby this takeover, it is therefore also to keep its place there.
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