In a massive investment move, Sony has invested $250 million USD for a minority stake in Epic Games, the company behind games such as Fortnite and now-defunct title, Paragon.
Epic Games has been seeing a lot of support as of recent in many ways. Companies have been investing heavy amounts of cash flow into the creators behind the Unreal Engine, Fortnite, and now-defunct Action MOBA title, Paragon.
With the next-generation of consoles just over the horizon, it’s unsurprising to see companies such as Sony making such big moves as Epic Games and Sony debuted the Unreal Engine 5 graphics engine during the PlayStation 5 reveal, which was rather impressive in how it ran.
Since this shareholder stake made by Sony, Epic Games has raised more than $1.83 billion dollars to date. This follows suit after the company received more than $330 million USD from Tencent who owns a 40% share of the company. The deal arises after Sony has taken into the move to allow a broader collaboration experience within Sony’s portfolio of entertainment assets and technology.
This also means that Sony can exclusively publish some of their games through the Epic Games Store for future Sony titles, and a plethora of other games moving forward. Of course, this deal isn’t solidified yet as it is subject to customary cl losing conditions as well as regulatory approvals by the FTC.
Sony’s total ownership sits at a 1.4% stake in Epic at this time, making them a minor shareholder at this time. With the next-gen consoles coming up, this does seem to be Sony’s move to heat things up and solidify their somehow interesting push into cross-platform technologies.
“Epic’s powerful technology in areas such as graphics places them at the forefront of game engine development with Unreal Engine and other innovations. There’s no better example of this than the revolutionary entertainment experience, Fortnite. Through our investment, we will explore opportunities for further collaboration with Epic to delight and bring value to consumers and the industry at large, not only in games, but also across the rapidly evolving digital entertainment landscape,” said Kenichiro Yoshida, Chairman, President and CEO, Sony Corporation.
It’s unsurprising though as Sony has made massive pushes towards the end of the PlayStation 4’s lifecycle in order to prepare for next-gen entertainment values, which also includes cutting-edge technology, “Sony and Epic have both built businesses at the intersection of creativity and technology, and we share a vision of real-time 3D social experiences leading to a convergence of gaming, film, and music. Together we strive to build an even more open and accessible digital ecosystem for all consumers and content creators alike,” said Tim Sweeney, Founder and CEO of Epic.”
The deal is expected to close in the rather near future and could see Sony and Epic preparing to make massive moves during the next console generation starting this winter. Their partnership should come as no surprise, however, as the two worked together on Paragon, as a PlayStation 4 exclusive, which shut down in late 2018 and has since seen new variants emerge including the highly anticipated Fault, which has already entered Early Access on Steam.
About the Writer(s):
Dustin is our native video game reviewer who has an appetite for anything that crosses the borders from across the big pond. His interest in JRPG’s, Anime, Handheld Gaming, and Pizza is insatiable. You can find him over on Twitter or Facebook where he interacts with his followers quite a bit!