Sega has officially completed its acquisition of Angry Birds maker Rovio, paying a cool $776 million for the company. The acquisition was first proposed in April, but both companies had to clear various finalisation and regulatory hurdles.
Despite the fact that the golden days of Angry Birds mania passed about 15 years ago, Sega is hopeful that the purchase would offer them a stronger presence in the mobile sector.
However, Rovio is more than just one IP. Aside from Angry Birds and its several spin-off games, the firm is best known for the match-three puzzler Sugar Blast and the narrative mystery game Small Town Murders. Okay, so those aren't exactly high-profile IPs, but Sega gains more than just recognisable franchise titles with this acquisition.
It receives a pre-built infrastructure for developing, publishing, and promoting mobile games. This means it can get started quickly when developing mobile games based on its own IPs, such as Sonic, Samba de Amigo, Persona, Football Manager, and others. There are also hundreds of older games that are just ready to be ported to mobile devices.
CEO Haruki Satomi stated in April that the mobile gaming market has particularly great potential, and it has been Sega's long-term ambition to accelerate its expansion in this field.
Aside from Sega's existing properties, new Angry Birds mobile games are likely to follow. Despite losing some of its late-2000s lustre, Angry Birds remains a popular game, with sequels, TV series, and even a weird restaurant in New York City.
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