Back in 2020, Tencent acquired a minority stake in Spec Ops: The Line Developer Yager. Now the company has increased its stake in the game development studio to become a majority stakeholder.
Games industry insider Daniel Ahmad recently confirmed through Twitter that Tencent continues to invest in Yager. Yager is only known for a handful of titles, most notably Spec Ops: The Line. The developers have also released Dreadnought and The Cycle. The Cycle is the most recent title the developer has released, but the team has been quite silent since the Tencent investment in 2020.
Tencent spent a lot of 2020 and 2021 investing in various gaming studios, with Yager just among 51 gaming-related deals that Tencent secured this year as of May 7. These Tencent gaming investments accounted for approximately 1 gaming-related investment every two and a half days over the year.
In 2019, Tencent closed a mere 10 gaming-related deals and in 2020 those deals rose to 31Â and now it maintains that momentum in 2021 as it already passed 50. Back in February of 2020, Tencent invested a minority stake in Yager and the company has significantly increased this investment since.
Tencent games oversees various popular games today, such as League of Legends, Call of Duty: Mobile, and Dungeon Fighter Online. Tencent accounts for 43% of China's domestic games market and the company is becoming more known in the West with each big gaming investment. Since the major Chinese company is increasing gaming-related investments each year, 2022 could be its biggest year of investments to date.
Many Chinese gamers are familiar with Tencent, but many in the West are also learning about the company as 21% of its total gaming revenue comes from overseas. Tencent remains a minority stake investor in several North American publishers as well. One specific publisher is Activision Blizzard, and developers there are expanding into the mobile market as a result. Some other notable companies that Tencent is partnered with are Electronic Arts, Nintendo, The Pokemon Company, and Ubisoft.
Tencent has officially become a majority stakeholder in Yager, but it's currently unclear what will happen as a result. No significant projects from Yager have been revealed since the minority stake investment came from Tencent. Tencent has yet to unveil what its plans for Yager are now that it has a majority stake in the company, but it will certainly involve more gaming projects. Tencent will likely continue to invest in various gaming developers and publishers as it expands its influence more each year.
Source: Niko Partners