Chapter 955 [Spin-off and Reorganization]

Stellar Capital spent US$50 billion to acquire Activision Blizzard at a sky-high price. This is the largest merger and acquisition case in the history of global gaming so far. The most important thing is that it was acquired by a company from a large Eastern country.

Unconsciously, a year has passed since the first M\u0026A invitation was launched to the time when the deal was finalized.

In fact, this efficiency is not slow anymore. You must know that this is not an ordinary corporate merger. It is a merger and acquisition event that can have a significant impact on the game industry. Even if it is delayed for two or three years, it may not be fruitful.

It can be said that in order to complete this merger and acquisition, Fang Hong went through a lot of effort.

Both above- and below-the-table methods have been used. How difficult is this? You must know that North America is currently full of hostility to Qunxing Capital. It can be seen that the degree of difficulty is very high. From the perspective of outsiders, Coming here is almost impossible.

It is basically impossible to do it without using some unconventional means under the table.

From the perspective of outsiders, Activision Blizzard's most valuable assets are probably its heavyweight game IPs, such as the "Call of Duty" series, the "Warcraft" series, the "Diablo" series and so on.

But Fang Hong values ​​Activision Blizzard the most, and believes that the most valuable thing is not these, but user data!

The number of monthly active users who play Activision Blizzard games worldwide exceeds 350 million. If Activision Blizzard is acquired at a sky-high price of US$50 billion, the value of user data will be worth US$30 billion, and the rest combined will be worth US$20 billion.

In fact, in Fang Hong's previous life, when Blizzard and Netizen broke up, the game version number was in his hands for life and death. What really matters is the data of Blizzard players in the Greater China market, which is the data of tens of millions of players and users. This is Super valuable stuff.

NetExpress has this data, and among other things, it can accurately push players with consumption potential into other games under NetExpress in the future. With this data, we can know which player earns the most money and which player is a pure prostitute. With a clear user profile, we can realize data monetization at a lower cost.

Therefore, the value of data is difficult to specifically estimate, and it can also be consumed across borders. As long as we have his detailed data information, we can more accurately infer that he may like other things besides games.

Activision Blizzard's global monthly active users have reached 350 million, and it is no exaggeration to say that it is worth US$30 billion.

But at this moment, Tian Jiayi was making a note, while Fang Hong continued to give instructions in a leisurely manner: "Buy Activision Blizzard, and the next step is to spin off and reorganize the company, and separate Activision and Blizzard. They are Activision Entertainment and Blizzard Entertainment. They are not affiliated with each other and operate independently."

After Vivendi bought Blizzard, it forcibly merged with Activision to form Activision Blizzard. Now it has been sold to Stellar Capital and is about to be split up.

Fang Hong continued: "In addition, the distribution department and channel department of Activision Entertainment will be spun off. In other words, after completing the reorganization, Activision Entertainment and Blizzard Entertainment will become a pure third-party game developer. Don’t get involved in things like distribution and channels. Since you are a third-party game developer, you should honestly make the game a good one, do this one thing, and do this one thing well.”

"The channels and distribution departments of Activision have been integrated into the game business department under the jurisdiction of Star Capital." Fang Hong said this and looked at the beautiful assistant and asked: "By the way, have you bought the trademark of the game box?"

The gaming division of Stellar Capital is to be the Netflix of the gaming industry, so distribution, channels, and publicity are all left to the platform. Whether it is Blizzard Entertainment or Activision Entertainment, they return to the original purpose of game development and work with all other third parties. Game developers are the same. They are only responsible for making games. They are responsible for making the games well and refined. After the products are developed, the platform will provide distribution, channels, publicity and other resources.

Fang Hong's arrangement is to further refine, specialize and specialize the division of labor. Those who make games will make the games well, and those who make the platform will run the platform well.

Tian Jiayi immediately replied: "I have already bought it."

The game platform that Stars Capital wanted to build was named "Game Box". When I went to register, I found that it had already been taken down. So Stars Capital had to use its tried and tested "money power" and offered the other party an offer that he could not refuse. price, and finally bought the trademark.

Hearing this, Fang Hong nodded with satisfaction: "Very good, whether it is the games of Activision and Blizzard that have been acquired, or the games of the third-party game developers that will be purchased soon, they are all available on the Game Box platform. , of course, including independent developers that we have not acquired, they can also apply to be published on the Game Box platform."

Players only need to register an account on the game box to play all the games on the platform, which is equivalent to cutting off the connection between players and third-party game developers.

It is foreseeable that the voice of third-party game developers will be greatly weakened in the future. The platform will control users and channel distribution, and its voice will soar.

From this point of view, splitting up Activision Blizzard also weakens their voice.

After a moment, Tian Jiayi said: "By the way, after Jeff Kaplan, the developer of "Overwatch" learned that Stellaris Capital was going to acquire Activision Blizzard, he had stated many times that if Stellaris Capital's acquisition was successful, he hoped to Returning to Blizzard with a project.”

Fang Hong also remembered this matter when he heard it. Jeff Kaplan was privately encouraged by people from Star Capital and promised to invest 500 million US dollars for him to establish an independent studio. Finally, Jeff Kaplan was persuaded. With a group of the original Blizzard development team, they left and set up a studio to develop "Overwatch".

An important factor why Jeff Kaplan hopes to return is the "Overwatch" project. Many settings and ideas are derived from Blizzard's previous "Titan" project. If he does not return to Blizzard, he may be involved in lawsuits and disputes later. , but if you return to Blizzard, these potential troubles will disappear directly.

Fang Hong nodded to himself: "Activision Blizzard is already mine, so let him return and merge his "Overwatch" studio into Blizzard Entertainment, and he will still be in charge of the project."

After thinking for a moment, Fang Hong added: "In addition, Blizzard Entertainment needs to make further major adjustments. The e-sports department of Blizzard Entertainment will be abolished. The annual Blizzard Carnival can remain the same, but the WCS tournament organized by Blizzard will be cancelled. It can be reduced to an exhibition match at the carnival. As for the overall e-sports package, leave it to WCG, and Blizzard will authorize and take a share of the profits from the e-sports area."

Fang Hong, who has memories of his past life, knows very well that Blizzard is a really good company at making games, and its creative capabilities are also very strong. Few peers can match it. For example, "Overwatch" started with a bang. Blizzard's game development and creative capabilities are The world's top, not many people have any objection to this.

But Blizzard is really hard to explain in terms of operating e-sports events. It has a bunch of top-level e-sports projects in its hands. The birth of e-sports originated from Blizzard’s "StarCraft", and later "StarCraft" 2", and then there will be "Hearthstone", and another king bomb "Overwatch" will be born soon.

But with so many good cards in his hand, he was beaten to pieces by Blizzard.

On the contrary, it is "League of Legends" developed by Riot Games next door. Riot Games is getting better and better in e-sports. If Fang Hong hadn't forcibly intervened in WCG to make all e-sports people and professional players regard the WCG championship as the highest honor, then If Riot is given two years to develop and operate, "League of Legends" can definitely make its S game a success.

Looking back at Fang Hong's previous Blizzard, it was really a catastrophic death-seeking behavior again and again. The fact that he could still breathe a sigh of relief and not die was also due to the foundation accumulated by Blizzard. As long as Riot Games is like Blizzard. If you commit suicide once, it will be hard to make a comeback if you don't say it will be gone immediately.

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