How Fortis focused on a developer-based M&A strategy | Jeferson Valadares interview

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In the downturn, life isn’t easy for game developers. Fortis hopes to provide some shelter for them so they can focus on making big triple-A games.

Founded by game veterans Shawn Foust, Steve Chiang, and Calvin Lau, Fortis started out with a bang by raising a lot of money from Las Vegas Sands, the big casino empire. That gave them a war chest to both grow its own game studios and acquire some as well.

Jeferson Valadares, a veteran of game companies — such as Doppio, Bandai Namco, Electronic Arts, BioWare and Playfish — came aboard as a vice president (with the acquisition of Doppio by Fortis) to help with corporate acquisitions of other game studios. While the economic environment has made other game companies risk averse, Fortis has a chance to continue building its development talent with acquisitions. The company can provide cover for its talent while they work on games.

I spoke with Valadares about this approach. Here’s an edited transcript of our interview.

GamesBeat: How big is Fortis now?

Jeferson Valadares: We eventually grew to the five teams we have now. We’re just over 300 people. The interesting thing about corporate development is that I’ve never done this before. It was a challenge that (cofounder) Shawn Foust sent to me. He interviewed a bunch of people and didn’t like anyone. It’s usually finance people. He said, “When we started, you brought in a team. You referred the two teams we acquired. You know how to network.” We’re in Brazil, but I’ve lived in Finland, in the