Electronic Arts to Buy PopCap Games for $750 Million

By Technology Desk; published on July 13, 2011 at 12:45 pm

• Tweet

• Tweet

EA has moved to acquire PopCap Games, which includes the popular games Plants vs. Zombies, Bejeweled and Zuma. The workers at the studio and the intellectual property owned by the company will become part of EA’s “drive towards a $1 billion digital business” – according to Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello.

PopCap Games was founded in 2000 and around 475 staff operating from the United States, Canada, Ireland, South Korea, China & Japan. Their games have been downloaded over 1.5 billion times and Bejeweled has sold more than 50 million units.

The deal is worth a total of $750 million – $650 million in cash and $100 million in shares. Riccitiello cited the excellent operating margins and growth of PopCap Games as the reason for the acquisition. Funding to the tune of $550 million has been provided to EA by Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc., J.P. Morgan Securities LLC, J.P. Morgan Chase Bank, N.A., UBS Securities LLC, and UBS Loan Finance LLC.

Share This

Tweet

Posted by Technology Desk on July 13, 2011. Filed under Gaming,Mergers & Acquisitions,Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

News Tags: Electronic Arts Inc, NASDAQ: ERTS, PopCap Games.

About Technology Desk

Editors and staffers from the Technology Desk at The Global Herald.

Website: http://theglobalherald.com/section/technology/