Tencent owns 15% of Helldivers 2 studio Arrowhead, it has emerged
Tech giant Tencent made an $80m investment in Arrowhead Game Studios last year
Tencent reportedly acquired a 15.75% stake in Arrowhead Game Studios last year.
According to Swedish financial publication Dagens Industri (subscription required, via PC Games Insider), the Chinese tech giant paid $80 million for its stake in the Helldivers studio in a deal which valued the company at $532.8m.
The remaining 84.25% of Arrowhead is owned by founders Johan Pilestedt, Emil Englund, Malin Hedstrom, Peter Lindgren, and Anton Stenmark.
It’s claimed that Arrowhead had a turnover of $100.2m last year and that it made a $76.2m profit.
Helldivers 2 was published by Sony for PS5 and PC last February and was a smash hit. The live service title was PlayStation’s fastest-selling game launch ever, with sales “far exceeding expectations” at 12m copies in its first 12 weeks.
“It’s fantastic fun and I feel incredibly proud of what the team has managed to achieve. Above all, it’s proof that what we do resonates with the player base,” Arrowhead chief creative officer and ex-CEO Johan Pilestedt told Dagens Industri.
On the subject of the Tencent deal, he added: “It also opens up opportunities for China as a market. Gaining access to the Chinese player base is the holy grail in the gaming industry.”
Writing on Discord last month (via Forbes), Arrowhead CEO Shams Jorjani said Helldivers 2’s success has given the studio more freedom when it comes to making and publishing its next title.
“The wonderful thing is that thanks to the amazing support of you FINE people Arrowhead’s future is quite bright and we have the freedom to explore some really cool concepts that we couldn’t have otherwise. Game 6 (our next project) will happen the way it will happen thanks to you.”
“The next game is 100% funded by ourselves so we’ll call 100% of those shots,” he added.
