Codemasters Bought by Take-Two Interactive

The rumors from a few days ago turned out to be true. Codemasters, a company known to all fans of racing games, will be taken over by the industry giant Take-Two Interactive, which also owns developer Rockstar and publisher 2K Games.

We learned about potential plans to acquire Codemasters last week. According to unofficial information published at the time, Take-Two Interactive was to make an offer to the British company, which it couldn't refuse, offering a total of 973 million dollars in exchange for 100 percent of its shares. Today, in communications addressed to investors of both companies we received an official confirmation of the agreement.

The purchase of the British company has yet to be accepted by all shareholders. The transaction will be finalized in the first quarter of 2021. The final price Take-Two will pay for Codemasters shares is 750 million popunds ($980 million). This is another major acquisition in the industry after Bethesda this year, as well as further consolidation of smaller and independent developers and publishers, which is not very good news for gamers and competition in the market.

Strauss Zelnick, CEO of Take-Two Interactive, expressed his satisfaction with the agreement in his statement. In his opinion, Codemasters' racing game catalog will significantly strengthen 2K Games' sports portfolio, which so far has been based mainly on games from the NBA 2K series. He also hopes to work closely with specialists from the British company (new driving model in GTA VI?). The head of the board of Codemasters said that the acquisition will improve the condition of the company and enable its development, contributing to further successes.

Let us recall that Codemasters has been operating on the market continuously since 1986. The developer very quickly specialized in racing and rally games. In its rich portfolio we can find popular series such as DiRT or F1. Last year the company bought the team at Slightly Mad Studios, responsible for the Project CARS brand.