Highlights

Playtika’s initial valuation range is ~$9B-$10B in its U.S. IPO (link)

• Playtika, a mobile gaming company owned by a Chinese investor group, said on Thursday it was aiming to raise as much as $1.67B in its initial public offering
• Certain funds and accounts managed by subsidiaries of BlackRock, Caledonia, Dragoneer Investment Group, and Tiger Global have indicated an interest in purchasing up to $600M in the aggregate in shares of common stock in the offering at the initial public offering price
• At the midpoint of the proposed range, Playtika Holding would command a fully diluted market value of ~$9.7B
• The company has produced nine games ranking in the top 100 highest grossing mobile games in the US, based on total in-app purchases (nine months ended September 30, 2020)

Apple removes 39,000 titles from its Chinese App Store (link)

• Apple removed 39,000 games from its Chinese App Store on December 31^st, which marks the most amount of games removed by Apple in a single day
• Apple had previously warned developers that it would remove unlicensed games in December

Riot Games unveils plans for League of Legends universe in 2021 (link)

• Riot Games has unveiled its plans for more updates and esports events in the League of Legends universe for 2021
• In 2021, Riot Games will take the initial steps toward building the Wild Rift esports ecosystem, creating a framework for players to compete globally and expanding on the previously announced tournaments in Southeast Asia and Japan
• North American players will be able to access the Wild Rift open beta beginning in early 2021

M&A and Capital Raising

Roblox Raises $520M led by Altimeter Capital and Dragoneer Investment Group (link)
LionTree served as exclusive financial advisor to Warner Music Group on its strategic investment in the round

• The Series H funding values the company at $29.5B and the proceeds from the financing will advance Roblox’s growth initiatives and mission to build a human co-experience platform that enables shared experiences among billions of users
• The Company intends to go public via direct listing after raising $520M in its Series H

Niantic acquires Mayhem to boost social gaming communities (link)

• Pokémon GO creator, Niantic, has acquired social gaming community platform Mayhem
• Mayhem was founded in San Francisco in 2017 with the goal of bringing gamers together through live interactive experiences
• Niantic CEO, John Hanke, said in a blog post that Mayhem team’s expertise in designing social gaming experiences and online community building will help Niantic drive new ways to connect its global community of players
• The majority of Mayhem’s team will join the Company, including Mayhem CEO Ivan Zhou, who will be part of Niantic’s social platform product team

Nintendo acquires Luigi’s Mansion 3 developer Next Level Games (link)

• Nintendo announced that it is acquiring Luigi’s Mansion 3 developer Next Level Games
• The Vancouver-based studio will join Nintendo’s first-party teams like Retro Studios and Nintendo Software Technology as a wholly owned subsidiary
• Luigi’s Mansion 3 has surpassed 8M copies sold and was the No. 15 best-seller in the US in November
• This is the first acquisition for Nintendo since Monolith Software in 2007

Epic Games acquires RAD Game Tools (link)

• Unreal Engine creator Epic Games has acquired software development firm RAD Game Tools
• RAD’s offerings have been used in around 25,000 games, including Epic’s flagship title Fortnite
• The acquisition will not prevent RAD Game Tools from continuing its work with other companies, across TV, film and games

Nordisk Games acquires 40% of MercurySteam (link)

• Danish media giant Nordisk Games has acquired 40% of Spanish developer MercurySteam for an undisclosed sum
• MercurySteam has previously worked on Castlevania: Lords of Shadow and the Metroid series, and in 2017 began developing its own episodic game Raiders of the Broken Planet, which was later rebranded as Spacelords

Others

Among Us clone ‘Werewolf Among Us’ accumulates 663k lifetime downloads (link)

• A clone of social deduction mega-hit Among Us known as ‘Werewolf Among Us’, developed by Shenzhen Youliang Technology, has generated an estimated 663,000 in mobile downloads, according to Sensor Tower
• Werewolf Among us has gone on to top the free game download chart on the App Store in China, since launching in the country on October 28th, 2020

Niantic brings The North Face x Gucci collection to Pokémon GO (link)

• Niantic has collaborated with The North Face x Gucci collection to bring cosmetic items to Pokémon GO
• The items can be collected from 100 PokeStops around the world, and players can match their in-game character by buying the items in person

Gaming Public Multiples