The creators of Eve Online might be selling the company

[johnhoftb]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...ter-approaches

CCP hf, the Icelandic game developer that created the cult classic Eve Online game, is exploring strategic options including a sale of the business after receiving interest from potential bidders, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

The closely held company’s owners, which include European investor Novator Partners LLP, U.S. investment fund General Catalyst Partners LLC and venture capitalist New Enterprise Associates Inc., are discussing whether or not to proceed with a sale, the people said, asking not to be identified because the deliberations are private. A sale of CCP could value the business at as much as 900 million euros ($955 million), the people said.

Representatives for CCP, General Catalyst and Novator declined to comment, while New Enterprise didn’t respond to a request for comment.

The gaming industry has seen a wave of mergers and acquisitions this year, with buyers committing about $20 billion on companies that make entertainment software, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The largest was the $8.6 billion acquisition deal for Finnish gamemaker Supercell Oy, targeted by a group lead by Chinese internet company Tencent Holdings Ltd.

Founded in 1997, CCP is focused on building multiplayer games for virtual reality headsets. Valkyrie, one of the latest in the Eve series, is an intergalactic space shooter that can be played on Microsoft Corp.’s Oculus Rift on PC, Sony Corp.’s PlayStation VR headset and HTC Corp.’s Vive. Gunjack 2 is available exclusively for Google’s Daydream, while its predecessor Gunjack can be played on Samsung Electronics Co.’s Gear VR, Facebook Inc.’s Oculus Rift and Vive, according to the company’s website.

CCP raised $30 million from New Enterprise and Novator in Nov. 2015. That round valued the company at $300 million, according to a person familiar with the matter.

[Deleted]

Not surprised, EVE has been slowly dying for years now, Valkyrie won't make them a lot of money until VR becomes much more accepted, and with the horrorshow that was Dust514 and its moronic PS3 exclusivity (not to mention EVE: Legion, which has apparently been scrapped and we are getting another FPS set in the EVE Universe, but that won't be for some time yet).

They've split there dev team too many ways in an attempt to grab any form of success before EVE finally dies off, but, imo, they've left it far too late.

CCP would do well to sell while they still can, but even if they do, I can't see anyone else turning EVEs fortunes around.

[chazus]

Not surprised, EVE has been slowly dying for years now

Not sure what you mean by 'dying'. The recent patch had their paid subscriptions jump to almost their peak, and even at the low point this year, was still up there pretty good.

[Super Kami Dende]

Hopefully whoever buys it puts Dust/Valk on next Gen and PC.

[Toppy]

Not sure what you mean by 'dying'. The recent patch had their paid subscriptions jump to almost their peak, and even at the low point this year, was still up there pretty good.

Well their issue as a company is that they're a complete on trick pony. They'd be smart to abandon ship as soon as possible.

I still dont know how they could have been so blatantly incompetent as to make a game that connects to EVE and then not allow their fanbase to actually play it.

[Deleted]

If you want to know the problem with eve online, as someone who has played since beta back in the day you need to simply watch this short video (1min 18seconds) that basically shows side by side the trailer they put out for the game (the recent one about killing Keepstars) side by side with the actual reality of killing a keepstar ingame to understand how unfixable this game is and how far from its promise it has become.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ojR7E8Xymk

With the latest push to F2P numbers are up, and just last night my alliance killed another Keepstar (this time an online one :P) but the experience is so opposite from fun to make that happen that the will of the community to keep going like this is at best jaded.

[Zeta333]

Not surprised, EVE has been slowly dying for years now, Valkyrie won't make them a lot of money until VR becomes much more accepted, and with the horrorshow that was Dust514 and its moronic PS3 exclusivity (not to mention EVE: Legion, which has apparently been scrapped and we are getting another FPS set in the EVE Universe, but that won't be for some time yet).

They've split there dev team too many ways in an attempt to grab any form of success before EVE finally dies off, but, imo, they've left it far too late.

CCP would do well to sell while they still can, but even if they do, I can't see anyone else turning EVEs fortunes around.

what? You dont seem to be based in reality, while iv been playing nonstop for the past 5 years i do have my critizimes for ccp they arnt selling. OP is a little off. CCP is most likely getting more investors or getting a new overall owner rather than just scrapping and selling the company outright. They have private investors right now that the playerbase doesnt know about, i see nothing changing with this news. As much as i strongly dissagree with the way they have taken this game through development changes the most recent patchs seem to have paid off alot with more subs, active players ect. As someone said we had a 5400 man fight just yesterday.

[Jtbrig7390]

Hopefully whoever buys it puts Dust/Valk on next Gen and PC.

Dust was shutdown and I don't see it returning at all. Valk is on next gen/pc but as a VR product.

Dust could have been cool but so much was wrong with it.

Always wanted to try EvE but I don't think I would get into it.

[Deleted]

Not sure what you mean by 'dying'. The recent patch had their paid subscriptions jump to almost their peak, and even at the low point this year, was still up there pretty good.

Source? I'm talking about Subscribers, not the amount of people logged onto Tranq.

As far as i'm aware CCP hasn't actively disclosed there subscriber numbers since 2013, which is never a good sign in any MMO.

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what? You dont seem to be based in reality, while iv been playing nonstop for the past 5 years i do have my critizimes for ccp they arnt selling. OP is a little off. CCP is most likely getting more investors or getting a new overall owner rather than just scrapping and selling the company outright. They have private investors right now that the playerbase doesnt know about, i see nothing changing with this news. As much as i strongly dissagree with the way they have taken this game through development changes the most recent patchs seem to have paid off alot with more subs, active players ect. As someone said we had a 5400 man fight just yesterday.

What isn't based in reality?

CCP have been wasting money on side projects instead of investing those funds back into EVE for years now. Dust was a failure, a complete and utter failure, Legion got scrapped before it even made it to Alpha, and Valkyrie won't be financially viable until VR is far more widepsread than it is now, until then the accolade of being "the best flight sim for VR" means about as much as a car being "the best self driving car".

They suckered a lot of people back in with the whole shared universe for numerous games, and so far we've got EVE, Dust514 which is being shutdown May next year, Legion which we aren't even getting, and then Valkyrie which will never hit numbers like EVE due to platform restrictions (you'd think they'd have learned the lessons on that one, but as ever CCP continue to fail in there own unique way).

EVE isn't dead, not by a longshot, but it is dying, as would any other 13 year old game be. The fact that CCP have kept it going for this long is an achievement, but to state that EVE is active or alive as it once was is ludicrous.

[DarkAmbient]

Fuck knows why anyone would want to invest in CCP, to be honest. Their VR development is the only part worth investing in, but even then I think headset VR is probably going to remain niche tech.

[dope_danny]

I'm not too surprised. Has anything they have made other than Eve been a success? anything at all?

[Zeta333]

Source? I'm talking about Subscribers, not the amount of people logged onto Tranq.

As far as i'm aware CCP hasn't actively disclosed there subscriber numbers since 2013, which is never a good sign in any MMO.

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What isn't based in reality?

CCP have been wasting money on side projects instead of investing those funds back into EVE for years now. Dust was a failure, a complete and utter failure, Legion got scrapped before it even made it to Alpha, and Valkyrie won't be financially viable until VR is far more widepsread than it is now, until then the accolade of being "the best flight sim for VR" means about as much as a car being "the best self driving car".

They suckered a lot of people back in with the whole shared universe for numerous games, and so far we've got EVE, Dust514 which is being shutdown May next year, Legion which we aren't even getting, and then Valkyrie which will never hit numbers like EVE due to platform restrictions (you'd think they'd have learned the lessons on that one, but as ever CCP continue to fail in there own unique way).

EVE isn't dead, not by a longshot, but it is dying, as would any other 13 year old game be. The fact that CCP have kept it going for this long is an achievement, but to state that EVE is active or alive as it once was is ludicrous.

No one that played eve ever thought any of that shit was going to happen. Only dillusionals that wernt allready players had any sort of imagination of the shared thingy happening.

I do not dissagree eve is going to die, but i think it will dwindle and dwindle just like wow did but with a much smaller playerbase. But right now, they look amazing to investors with thier massive influx of players and the big fight that just happened. I mean fuck even ccp made a promo video promoting the fuck out of the keepstar fight. Ill put money someone big is investing or they will get a sugar daddy company.