Tomas is a Gaming Author at Android Police and writes news, features, and reviews based on the latest releases and exciting developments within the video game industry. Previously a Staff Writer at Digital Trends, Tomas is passionate about sharing game developers’ stories, analyzing video game history, and contextualizing those things within the modern video game industry. Tomas’ byline has also appeared on GameSpot, ComicBook, Noisy Pixel, MMORPG.com, Palette Swap, Inverse, and DualShockers. In his spare time, Tomas also loves watching movies and reading comic books.
The next major video game company acquisition just happened, and it's quite an unexpected one. EA, the popular but infamous publisher behind series like Battlefield, Madden, and Skate, is being bought out by three separate companies.
As a result, it will go private once this acquisition is complete. What's even more shocking is the entities behind the companies that bought EA, like Saudi Arabia and Jared Kushner.
What companies acquired EA?
And how much did EA cost?
Source: EACredit: EAAccording to a press release from Monday morning, EA is being purchased by PIF, Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners. In total, the acquisition will cost $55 billion, although EA will be saddled with $20 billion in debt because of the deal. EA's shareholders will be bought out, and the company will go private following the acquisition, making this the largest such deal ever. EA's current CEO Andrew Wilson will stay with the company following the acquisition.
While a lot of video game company acquisitions have stayed within the industry, you probably haven't heard of the ones that bought EA. That's because the companies that bought EA, like Silver Lake, are private equity investment firms that purchase other companies and then try to make as much money off them as possible. PIF is a controversial wealth fund from Saudi Arabia that has attempted to break into the video game and esports industries with its company Savvy Games Group.
Meanwhile, Affinity Partners is another investment firm run by Jared Kushner, the disliked son-in-law of United States President Donald Trump, whose tariffs have wreaked havoc on the video game industry. Kushner says he played EA's games growing up and "couldn't be more excited about what's ahead" in the press release. Still, the involvement of Saudi Arabia and Jared Kushner in this deal obviously doesn't elicit much excitement or hope about this deal.
When it comes to EA's future, there are still a lot of unknowns, even if Battlefield 6 is poised for a massive launch on October 10. PIF's head of international investments, Turqi Alnowaiser, said the acquisition would "further drive EA’s long-term growth," while Silver Lake's Co-CEO Egon Durban claims this deal "accelerates innovation, expands its reach worldwide, and continues to deliver incredible experiences to players and fans across generations."
Even EA's own Andrew Wilson seemed hopeful and optimistic in his own statement on the acquisition. But looking past that corporate jargon speak, we shouldn't be that excited about this deal as gamers. As EA is going private and being saddled with billions in debt, layoffs and project cancellations seem likely as its new investors look to cut costs.
An article from The New York Times that revealed this acquisition ahead of its official announcement also suggested that EA's new owners would like to bring more of its series to mobile and increase the number of microtransactions in them. That's not great, so we'll have to wait and see what happens over the next several years once the deal is complete and closes in fiscal year 2027.
