THQ Nordic has been acquiring a lot of studios in the past and the latest two gaming studios joining THQ Nordic’s umbrella are Bugbear Entertainment and Coffee Stain Studios.
Coffee Stain is known as the developer behind Goat Simulator. They developed and published the game back in and they also developed and released some DLC packs for the game as well. Acquiring the Studio now gives the IP Rights to THQ Nordic. Along with Goat Simulator, THQ Nordic also now owns Satisfactory and Sanctum and the publishing rights to Deep Rock Galactic.
THQ Nordic now owns 100% shares of Coffee Stain. The amount paid to acquire the studio is revealed to be $34.8 million. This is not the final amount as their will be additional earn-outs as well if Coffee Stain manages to reach certain milestones in the future. As of now, predictions are that the net sales will reach around $21.9 million to $27.4 million in the next fiscal year.
With THQ Nordic now in charge, Coffee Stain will still operate as an independent group. The official announcement states it as ‘highly complementary third leg in THQ Nordic’. The CEO of Coffee Stain, Anton Westbergh, will remain for the time being but will now report to THQ Nordic’s chief executive Lars Wingfors.
Alongside Coffee Stain, THQ Nordic has managed to buy 90% of Bugbear Entertainment which is a Finnish studio behind racing game titles such as Wreckfest. Bugbear is a 19-person development team whose latest project is Wreckfest. THQ Nordic and Bugbear released the title in early 2018 making it one of the best titles ever sold by them.
Bugbear’s previous projects include the Flatout series and Ridge Racer Unbounded. With now THQ Nordic owning 90% of company shares, Wreckfest IP is now under THQ Nordic’s belt. The total amount of the acquisition was not announced but it was said that it was a mutually decided amount which ‘matches management’s estimated royalty payments to Bugbear in the coming three years.
With both the studios under THQ Nordic’s umbrella, we can hope that both of them can continue to make great game titles such as Goat Simulator and Wreckfest in the future as well. Goat Simulator was a very highly rated physics based sandbox game where your main character was a goat. It received many fun DLCs later which really made the game stand out from the other titles on the market.
What do you think about THQ Nordic’s decision of acquiring both these studios? Let us know in the comments section below.
Article Source: gamesindustry.biz
