Lara - the jewel in the crown
It would appear that SCi’s bid to take a dominant stake in leading UK publisher Eidos is almost complete, as rival suitor Elevation partners withdraws from the race for the firm today.
Elevation, headed by former Electronic Arts hatchet man John Riccitiello, announced this morning that it would no longer be tendering for Eidos, in news that surprised analysts, given the firm’s aggressive approach to the courtship in recent weeks.
Elevation’s key lure was the fact that it brought to the table an all-cash offer, seeing 50p per Eidos share, well above the firm’s trading price which slumped to the mid-thirties following various bogus news stories relating to its future. As you may remember, the stories appearing at that time read, “Eidos insiders confirm News Corp deal is imminent". Astonishingly, the publication in question never even called either party, falling for a sucker punch of epic proportions.
This news now clears the path for SCi, a firm expected to unpick Eidos from the top down, with executive positions already believed to be under threat. Eidos’ studio structure and base-level developer management is also expected to come in for a considerable amount of shuffling.
"The directors of EM Holding note the strong support from Eidos' shareholders that the SCi offer has received," read the statement, "…and would like to wish Eidos and its stakeholders well under the proposed stewardship of SCi."
The deal with SCi is expected to be greenlighted at Eidos’ shareholder meeting slated for May 13, with a restructure program beginning in June 2005.
Elevation, headed by former Electronic Arts hatchet man John Riccitiello, announced this morning that it would no longer be tendering for Eidos, in news that surprised analysts, given the firm’s aggressive approach to the courtship in recent weeks.
Elevation’s key lure was the fact that it brought to the table an all-cash offer, seeing 50p per Eidos share, well above the firm’s trading price which slumped to the mid-thirties following various bogus news stories relating to its future. As you may remember, the stories appearing at that time read, “Eidos insiders confirm News Corp deal is imminent". Astonishingly, the publication in question never even called either party, falling for a sucker punch of epic proportions.
This news now clears the path for SCi, a firm expected to unpick Eidos from the top down, with executive positions already believed to be under threat. Eidos’ studio structure and base-level developer management is also expected to come in for a considerable amount of shuffling.
"The directors of EM Holding note the strong support from Eidos' shareholders that the SCi offer has received," read the statement, "…and would like to wish Eidos and its stakeholders well under the proposed stewardship of SCi."
The deal with SCi is expected to be greenlighted at Eidos’ shareholder meeting slated for May 13, with a restructure program beginning in June 2005.
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Comments
config 22 Apr 2005 15:19
1/3
Question being, is SCi a better deal for Eidos than Elevation?
Forget that SCi is a British company, BritSoft solidarity and all that crap.. Forget the shareholders - the life sucking clueless fscks. Let's just think about the game output.
Will Eidos be the better for this?
Forget that SCi is a British company, BritSoft solidarity and all that crap.. Forget the shareholders - the life sucking clueless fscks. Let's just think about the game output.
Will Eidos be the better for this?
Pilot13 23 Apr 2005 16:06
2/3
It's a good question, whether better under SCI or 'Elevation'. I'd like to reserve judgement, but if Eidos f**k up Deus Ex again...well...
Mendez 25 Apr 2005 09:52
3/3
Pilot13 wrote:
It's a good question, whether better under SCI or 'Elevation'. I'd like to reserve judgement, but if Eidos f**k up Deus Ex again...well...
Gotta give 'em credit for spotting how f**ked up "Deus Ex: Clan Wars" was going to be, renaming it "Project Snowblind" in double time. Utterly, utterly dire.