Game studio Rovio, known as the developer of the hit Angry Birds franchise, received a new offer on 19 January from Israeli holding company Playtika to buy the company, which was valued at around $738 million. This was reported by news agency Reuters on its website.

The current offer values each share in the company at around €9.05(almost $10), which is 60% more than the company’s market value. In addition, this offer from Playtika is as much as 40 million euros more than a similar offer from the holding company last autumn.

Rovio declined to comment on the situation, with its shares on the Finnish stock exchange dropping 2.5% before an offer from a buyer was made public.

A side note: Rovio Entertainment acquires Ruby Games studio

The state of affairs at the Angry Birds creators

Rovio was founded way back in 2003, but first went public on the Finnish stock exchange in 2017 at $11.5 per share. The developers enjoyed worldwide success with the release of the Angry Birds franchise in 2009. It has been downloaded more than one billion times since then, with 250 million coming from paid versions of the app.

angry birds
Angry Birds has been downloaded over 1 billion times

Since the release of this hugely popular casual game, Rovio and its success as a game developer has literally depended on Angry Birds. Despite this, the company has been doing well throughout 2022, and its revenues have only been increasing.

Playtika, an Israeli holding company that focuses on mobile casino and poker apps, announced that they would lay off at least 615 people (15% of their workforce). Shares for the company have almost halved in the past year, leading to the closure of some of the studios within the holding company.

How the deal will end, whether the Finns will sell the company and what the future holds for Angry Birds developers is still unknown, but the situation will clear up soon.

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