Drake Star: Q1 game deals hit $98.7B in value, more than all of 2022
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Microsoft’s $68.7 billion plan to buy Activision Blizzard and Take-Two’s $12.7 billion bid to buy Zynga pushed the first quarter toward a massive $98.7 billion in total value for game deals, according to a report by Drake Star Partners.
That compares to $85 billion for all of last year, which itself was a massive leap over 2020’s $32.7 billion in deals. But even if you didn’t count the biggest deals, there was also Sony’s $3.6 billion purchase of Bungie, said Michael Metzger, partner at investment bank Drake Star in an interview with GamesBeat.
“We hit almost $100 billion in deal value in the same quarter. Several years ago would have been totally unthinkable,” said Metzger. “That’s fantastic.”
The March edition of Drake Star’s Global Gaming Industry Report said the 387 Q1 deals compared to 1,159 in all of 2021 and 505 deals for all of 2020. Making sense of this kind of activity is one of the themes of our GamesBeat Summit 2022 event happening from April 26 to April 28 next week. (Tickets here).
Drake Star continues to forecast that deals for all of 2022 could exceed $150 billion. And the number of investments in game companies in 2022 is expected to hit a record, Metzger said. Gaming companies that have historically focused on the PC / console segment will continue expanding and diversifying into mobile, and vice versa. The acquisition of western studios by Asian companies will accelerate.
The activity shows the underlying health of the industry — boosted by continuous investment and acquisitions — as well as huge changes coming as industry consolidation happens across all gaming sectors of PC, console,
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