EA acquires Chillingo for $20mm; Angry Birds now angrier than ever

By on Oct 20, 2010 at 5:24 PM
Gaming October 20, 2010

Electronic Arts confirmed today that it will acquire Angry Birds publisher Chillingo in a deal rumored to be worth just under $20 million. Unfortunately the birds aren’t likely to see much of that cash, as Rovio, the developer behind the wildly popular mobile game, is not a part of the acquisition. In fact, Rovio has since told TechCrunch that it will not be using Chillingo anymore — news that EA is likely not too happy about. Chillingo has published several popular mobile games including Angry Birds and Cut the Rope, developed by ZeptoLab. Angry Birds and Cut the Rope are currently ranked No. 1 and 3 respectively on Apple’s paid app charts. The deal comes on the heels of the company’s $400 million acquisition of Japanese mobile game developer Ngmoco. Clearly, EA has no plans of slowing its attack on the mobile gaming space.

Read (EA to acquire Chillingo) Read (Rovio to dump Chillingo)

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19 Comments

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  • John

    Where you at, PSP and DS?

  • sean

    Wait when did EA buy Ngmoco?

  • bbfan1986

    It seems like the little guy just gets into it to make a big name for itself and then sells that name to a troll like EA. They’ll do what they always do and just make the purchase for the IP and get rid of the talent or drive them out.

  • Hendrix

    From what I am seeing, EA bought the publisher of Angry Birds, not the Developers. Apparently the dev house still owns all rights and IP for Angry Birds.

    • superchunk

      That’s what I read too, but it seems stupid to not buy the biggest IPs, unless thought the pubs would remain in control of publishing rights.

      • Eric

        Yeah I would take the 20 million and haul ass.

  • http://www.lgcentral.com FT

    So EA’s getting bigger and bigger. That can’t be a bad thing… or can it?

    • Android needs GPU hardware acceleration already!

      If they become like Apple, it is.

  • John

    Angry Birds Halloween coming out today for iPhone and iPad!!!!

  • bbfan1986

    anyone on Game Center and want to add a friend look me up under “rcmadiax” The only person I know with an iOS 4.2 device is my GF and shes not much of a gamer

    • Eric

      Why do I have to have 4.2 on my iPhone to add you in game center?

      • bbfan1986

        I’m sorry I meant 4.1 my bad…..

  • Fact Check

    Ngmoco is not a Japanese company, nor was it bought by EA, it was bought by DeNA, which is a Japanese company. HELLOOOOOOOO

  • Game One

    Can someone explain to me the role of a publisher in the gaming space? Rovio builds the game and submits it to the app store, right? And what does Chillingo have to do with this?

    Also, the media is going berserk with the ‘angry birds publisher’ story..Chillingo apparently is a “publisher” to a lot of games on a lot of platforms. Angry Birds is just one small bird in the whole scheme of things.

    • Nu11u5

      Publishers normally handle marketing and related materials, as well as disk printing and distribution channels for physical sales. They also often fund small developers in exchange for certain deals and rights.

      The place for publishers still exists but its been shrinking in recent years as digital sales are on the rise. The big thing for publishers now is DRM management and online service hosting.

  • piper
    • http://paul.rutgers.edu/~vatsav Srivatsav

      May be crush the castle got ripped off from angry birds !!!

  • DonRSD

    EA bought the NFL rights for videogames and we have been stuck playing madden since 2006

    im waiting for feb 2013 when 2k sports can finally come back.

    ea buys a game/license and does nothing with it.

    ea hates competition.

    LONG LIVE NFL 2k!!!!

  • http://gim.acanaday.com Aaron Canaday

    ngmoco was started by Neil Young, a former exec at Electronic Arts, and is not a Japanese company.

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