Fifa publisher Electronic Arts offers £945m to buy UK gaming firm Codemasters

Smaller firm’s shares jump 20 per cent on the prospect of a bidding war

Ben Chapman
Monday 14 December 2020 19:47 GMT
Comments
The deal would bring together EA's range of popular sports titles, including Fifa, with Codemasters' racing games such as F1 and the DiRT rally franchise
The deal would bring together EA's range of popular sports titles, including Fifa, with Codemasters' racing games such as F1 and the DiRT rally franchise (Codemasters)

Your support helps us to tell the story

This election is still a dead heat, according to most polls. In a fight with such wafer-thin margins, we need reporters on the ground talking to the people Trump and Harris are courting. Your support allows us to keep sending journalists to the story.

The Independent is trusted by 27 million Americans from across the entire political spectrum every month. Unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock you out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. But quality journalism must still be paid for.

Help us keep bring these critical stories to light. Your support makes all the difference.

US games company Electronic Arts (EA) is set to acquire British firm Codemasters after making an offer of £945m. The deal would bring together EA’s range of popular sports titles, including the Fifa series, with Codemasters' racing games such as F1 and the DiRT rally franchise.

EA’s offer torpedoed a proposed £759m deal between Codemasters and Grand Theft Auto publisher Take-Two.

Shares in Codemasters jumped by 20 per cent on Monday to well above the price offered by EA, indicating that investors think a bidding war may break out.

EA’s chief executive, Andrew Wilson, said: “We believe there is a deeply compelling opportunity in bringing together Codemasters and EA to create amazing and innovative new racing games for fans.

“Our industry is growing, the racing category is growing, and together we will be positioned to lead in a new era of racing entertainment.

“We have admired Codemasters’ creative talent and high-quality games for many years.

“With the full leverage of EA’s technology, platform expertise, and global reach, this combination will allow us to grow our existing franchises and deliver more industry-defining racing experiences to a global fan-base.”

The chairman of Codemasters, Gerhard Florin, said: “Electronic Arts and Codemasters have a shared ambition to lead the video game racing category.

"The board of Codemasters firmly believes the company would benefit from EA’s knowledge, resources and extensive global scale – both overall and specifically within the racing sector.

“We feel this union would provide an exciting and prosperous future for Codemasters, allowing our teams to create, launch and service bigger and better games to an extremely passionate audience.”

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in