Mobile gaming giant Scopely has agreed to acquire the gaming division of Pokémon Go developer Niantic for $3.5 billion. Niantic will also add $350 million in cash, bringing the total value of the deal to $3.85 billion.
Niantic's catalog of games includes:
- Pokémon Go, which has more than 20 million active players per week;
- Pikmin Bloom, a walking game launching in 2021;
- Monster Hunter Now, an AR game launching in 2023;
- Campfire, a platform for community interaction;
- Wayfarer, a tool for adding new locations to maps in Niantic games.
Scopely writes that Niantic's entire game development team and executives will join Scopely's 2,300 employees in Asia to continue developing and supporting game projects. The deal is still subject to regulatory approval.
Niantic said it is spinning out its geospatial artificial intelligence business into a new company, Niantic Spatial. This will allow the company to grow faster and scale its technology separately from its core business. It will be led by Niantic CEO and founder John Hanke.
At launch, Niantic Spatial will receive $250 million in funding: $200 million from Niantic's budget and $50 million from Scopely. All of Niantic's original investors will remain shareholders in Niantic Spatial.
The new company will develop spatial intelligence to help people better understand, navigate, and interact with the physical world.
What is known about the deal?
- Niantic was spun off from Google in 2015. Its game Pokémon Go became a global phenomenon, but the company was unable to replicate that success. As a result, it had to cut staff and cancel some other games. Niantic is based in San Francisco and makes other products, including tools for creating 3D scans of real-world locations.
- Mobile game maker Scopely, which has an office in Ukraine, was acquired two years ago for $4.9 billion by Savvy Games, a subsidiary of Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund. The fund aims to diversify the country's economy by investing in the gaming industry.
