Microsoft buying Activision Blizzard. Take-Two Interactive buying Zynga. Sony buying Group buying, well, everything. Amid a wave of mass games industry consolidation, it's no surprise that shareholders grilled Ubisoft executives today during the publisher's third-quarter earnings call about its own interest in making major acquisitions of its own, or being acquired. But Ubisoft's leadership is, at least publicly, maintaining an air of disinterest for now super an entertaining of your minds most of this was accomplished without much need for Ubisoft to acquire other huge companies, though it's certainly done that too, if on a much smaller scale than investors are asking about. In recent years Ubisoft has picked up mobile publisher Green Panda Games developer Blue Mammoth, anti-cheat developer Game Blocks, mobile developer Games, server company net and several more not really what's being talked about here. As the publisher points out, Ubisoft has become both very valuable and very successful on its own steam, a notable triumph after the long-running battle between Ubisoft and not that long ago. Its discussion of organic growth can be interpreted to mean that the publisher is comfortable not doing much in the way of massive acquisitions of its own anytime soon, so we're not likely to see Ubisoft try to pick up Take-Two or something tomorrow of course, all that discussion of how valuable and successful Ubisoft prompted questions of a different sort from investors on the call. As one pointed out about 12 minutes in, if Ubisoft's assets are so highly valued right now, is this not a prime moment to sell the company to someone else?
CEO Yves Guillemot responded with a somewhat cautious declaration of independence:
"Ubisoft can remain independent...our IPs are sought after by the biggest global players in entertainment and tech he said Having said that, if there were an offer to buy us, the board of directors would of course review it in the interest of all stakeholders There are two things of note here. The first is that this is a fairly standard statement for any executive to make when asked this question. Acquisition discussions, especially for companies like this, happen constantly, and more often than not they go now here But we never hear about them until the deal actually goes through due to a number of legal prohibitions to keep financial speculation from running wild, among other reasons super man much any company executive, then, when asked if company might be acquired at some point, has to walk a tightrope of "Maybe, also maybe not to avoid both making definitive statements but also outright But it is somewhat notable that this is a gentler response than Guillemot could have given, especially given Ubisoft's history with and fighting off acquisitions. Given how hard Ubisoft pushed back against a potential takeover only four years ago, even a gentle crack in the acquisition door from the company CEO is worth going good story love it who nice so pretty women so cool game pretty one day one boy die.
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