As the games industry moves on from “survive til 25,” 2024 games investment and M&A data revealed recovery and improvement, according to market analyst firm Digital Development Management (DDM).
In order to properly compare 2024 to 2023, it’s important to remember that in Q4 2023 Microsoft acquired Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion, the largest gaming M&A in history by over 5.4 times its nearest counterpart of Take-Two Interactive’s $12.7 billion acquisition of Zynga.
Removing Microsoft’s acquisition as an outlier, 2024 was a stronger year totaling $17.5 billion across 985 in combined investments and M&As (+39% in value and +16% in volume compared to 2023’s $12.6 billion across 848 investments and M&As). This is particularly evident by dissecting 2024 in totality.
DDM is the latest party to report on deals for games in 2024. Other data has already come in from Konvoy Ventures, Drake Star Partners, and Quantum Tech Partners. One thing unique about DDM is that it has a 2025 forecast.
“While the games industry has made it through ‘survive til’ 25,’ DDM’s outlook remains cautiously optimistic. However, the belt-tightening is certainly not over as DDM expects the games industry to suffer more layoffs, pivots from in-house game development to external, and divestitures of non-core business offerings,” said Mitchell Reavis, manager of the DDM Games Investment Review, in a statement.
DDM’s game M&A activity by quarter.
The game industry’s 2024 investments totaled $7.7 billion across 812 investments (+68% in value and +18% in volume over 2023’s $4.6 billion over 691 investments) which show volume is bouncing back towards 2022’s record highs of 1001 investments.
And 2024 M&A deals totaled $9.9 billion across 173 transactions, which is +22% in value and +10% in volume compared to 2023’s $8.1 billion across 157 transactions (excluding Microsoft acquisition of Activision Blizzard $68.7 billion as an outlier).
And 2024 new fund announcements totaled $58.9 billion in new capital raised across 132 funds (+25% in value and +7% in volume compared to 2023 totaling $47.2 billion across 123 funds)
DDM M&A pie graph for Q4 2024.
Although Q4’s $6.0 billion across 236 investments and M&As was the largest quarter in 2024, Q4’s high M&A values disguised a regression in investment values:
DDM said Q4 2024 investments saw a sizable decline in value — $906.2 million across 201 investments (−35% in value and +4% in volume compared to Q3’s $1.4 billion and 193 investments) marks the lowest value since Q3 2018 ($650.6 million). Volume remained strong as Q4 was +7% above the 2-year quarterly average of 187 investments. Investment values were dampened from early-stage investments representing the majority (66%)
·Meanwhile, Q4 2024 M&As saw a large increase in value — $5.0 billion across 35 transactions (+572% in value and -30% in volume compared to Q3’s $751.1 million across 50 transactions) enabling Q4 to surpass the combined value of Q1-Q3 M&As of $4.8 billion; this was achieved through EQT Groups and others’ $2.7 billion acquisition of Keywords St …