Featured Image Credit: EA
Topics: Disney, Battlefield, FIFA
According to a new report, Electronic Arts is getting ready to either sell or merge with another, larger company.
Puck (via Kotaku) writes that the Battlefield and FIFA publisher has spent the last few years attempting to sell itself to a number of major companies, but to no avail.
The report suggests EA was at one point in the final stages of a deal with NBC Universal, but negotiations fell apart over the price. Disney, Apple, and Amazon were also apparently among the companies EA approached, although it doesn't sound as if there are any deals on the way at the moment.
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According to Puck, EA's longing to be acquired has been so for some time, but it really kicked up a gear after the shocking news that Microsoft had bought Activision Blizzard. Now I can't stop imagining EA as the last single friend at the wedding.
"In recent years, as media companies have taken greater interest in the rapidly growing gaming industry, Wilson and Electronic Arts have held talks with a number of different potential suitors, including Disney, Apple and Amazon, sources with knowledge of those talks told me," reads the report. "Several sources familiar with these talks say EA has been persistent in pursuing a sale, and has only grown more emboldened in the wake of the Microsoft-Activision deal."
The piece goes on to suggest that Disney was, at least at one stage, the most likely candidate for a partnership. This is largely owing to the fact that EA and Disney worked together for several years as the former won the exclusive rights to develop and publish Star Wars video games, a deal that only recently expired.
Of course, we all remember how that went.