After the sale ofBorderlandsdeveloperGearboxto Take-Two in a deal worth $460 million,EmbracerCEO Lars Wingefors held an investors call to speak about the divestment.
In the call, Wingefors confirmed that the sale of Gearbox was the final piece in the company’s ‘restructuring plan’ which resulted in over 1,300 job cuts and the cancellation of over 25 games.
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“We are ending the restructuring programme now, end of March, and the Gearbox restructuring process has been part of that programme,” Wingefors said (thanks,RPS). He revealed that assets divested from Embracer had “negative cashflow” and the collective would now be “cashflow generative” following the separation of those assets.
Shockingly, one investor asked Wingefors if Embracer was ready to begin buying again, to which the CEO responded “I think it’s way too early to start talking about restarting the [mergers and acquisitions] engines again.”
He went on to clarify the current objectives of the conglomerate, saying “We are in the late phases of the consideration into the future of the group, and that’s our highest focus and priority - how we set up ourselves and structure ourselves, and utilise our assets we have within the group, and have them work together, and how we leverage them better working together, utilising different functions.”
“I think that’s our focus right now, to increase profitability and cashflow generation, by simply making better products and games,” he finished. Embracer Group hasn’t seen a lot of recent success and has shuttered several of the studios it acquired, such as Volition, creator of theSaints Rowseries and Free Radical, best-known for Timesplitters.
Additionally, publisher Saber Interactive was spun off in a $500 million deal that included 4A Games (Metro), Zen Studios and 3D Realms.
Wingefors’ answer is heartening, as Embracer Group’s pattern of mass acquisition and subsequent closure or divestment isn’t a fate you’d wish on any studio.
Embracer Group currently owns over 100 studios worldwide, including Flying Wild Hog, Dambuster Studios, Warhorse, Ghost Ship Games, Crystal Dynamics, Eidos Montreal, Aspyr, Beamdog and Tripwire Interactive.
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