Tag Archives: vivendi

Activision goes independent in $8.2 billion buyout

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Bobby COD-Ghosts-In-The-Weeds-jpg_182637Kotick, the sometimes controversial CEO of Activision-Blizzard, is leading an $8.2 billion buyout from parent company Vivendi, a move that will restore independence to the world’s largest video game publisher.

The agreement will occur in a pair of purchases. Activision, as a company, will acquire 429 million shares for $5.83 billion in cash, while an investor group headed by Kotick and co-chairman Brian Kelly will separately purchase another 172 million shares for $2.34 billion. Kotick and Kelly have personally invested a combined $100 million into the company.

Read more at Yahoo! Games

Activision on the block: Assessing the potential buyers

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Vivendi might be getting more serious about offloading Activision-Blizzard.

Reuters reports the French conglomerate has been in talks with a number of video game (and mass media) companies about a potential sale of the industry’s top seller.

That makes for a good headline – and I have no doubt about Reuters’ report, but as the industry works itself into a frenzy trying to guess whether Microsoft, Time Warner, or Tencent will be the new home of Call of Duty and Diablo, too many people are failing to scratch the surface.

Read more at Gamasutra