EA is reportedly looking to go private

Electronic Arts is in “advanced talks” to potentially go private, getting acquired by a handful of investors, namely Affinity Partners, Silver Lake Partners, and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund. The reported buyout is standing at $50 billion.

Wall Street Journal reports (via VGC) the news, which caused a 15% spike in shares. Should the deal go through, this would be a huge acquisition, as like it or not, EA is a gaming giant. Now, the biggest name interested in the buyout is by far Saudi Arabia’s PIF, which is the country’s official investment fund into the gaming scene as a bid to make itself less reliant on oil.

Beyond EA, PIF already has made investments in many publicly traded game studios, including Take-Two Interactive and Ubisoft. Ubisoft is even making a DLC for Assassin’s Creed Mirage set in Saudi Arabia as part of PIF’s investment.

Gabriel Stanford-Reisinger Editor-in-Chief

Gabe has been a gamer since he was young, playing games like Pajama Sam, Freddi Fish, Guitar Hero, and whatever looked cool on GameFly. Ever since 2018, he's been infatuated with the inner workings of the gaming and entertainment industries, covering a wide range of topics from video games to TV and film. Starting as a contributor for PSX Extreme, he's worked his way up to its Managing Editor. Using what's he learned over the years, he founded Smash Jump to remind everyone to smash jump.