Ever since the Activision-Vivendi merger, there has been talk in the game industry that EA would try to acquire more developers and publishers to try to compete against the new, monolithic Activision Blizzard. As early as December, according to EA CEO John Riccitiello, EA was contemplating making an acquisition bid for Take-Two Interactive, and their $2 billion offer was made public over the weekend after Take-Two's board rejected the offer. We know all of this because EA kindly created a website called EATake2 with an explanation of their offer. The original offer, for $25 per share, was presented on February 15th, and the public only became aware of if it over the weekend.
Riccitiello makes it clear that they originally wanted to conduct this negotiation in private but that Take-Two's response compelled them to go public. It is certainly possible that EA may have entered into private negotiations with other studios. We at GameCyte did some digging and noticed something curious. If you look at the WhoIs information for EATake2.com, you see the following listing:
ICANN Registrar: GODADDY.COM, INC.
Created: 2008-02-22
Expires: 2009-02-22
Registrant:
Domains by Proxy, Inc.
DomainsByProxy.com
15111 N. Hayden Rd., Ste 160, PMB 353
Scottsdale, Arizona 85260
United States
It is registered through a company to keep the registrant private, but we now know the registrant to be EA. If you look at the WhoIs for the domain EAUbisoft.com, you will see:
ICANN Registrar: GODADDY.COM, INC.
Created: 2008-02-22
Expires: 2009-02-22
Registrant:
Domains by Proxy, Inc.
DomainsByProxy.com
15111 N. Hayden Rd., Ste 160, PMB 353
Scottsdale, Arizona 85260
United States
There is no guarantee that EA is the registrant of both domains, but given the close timing of the registrations, it seems very plausible that EA has ongoing private negotiations with Ubisoft to increase their 19.9% stake and further put pressure on Activision Blizzard. Could another announcement from EA be imminent?
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February 25th, 2008 at 7:08 pm
[...] EA and Ubisoft? [GameCyte] tr { border: 0px } td { cellborder: 10px; padding:5px; } table { border: 1px solid silver; margin-left: 20px; width: 540px; padding: 5px; } [...]
February 25th, 2008 at 7:34 pm
[...] EA and Ubisoft? [GameCyte] [...]
February 25th, 2008 at 8:32 pm
[...] release on its recently registered website, EATake2.com. Subtle, huh? And now it gets scary: GameCyte reports EA has also registered the domain name EAUbisoft.com. Could our beloved Ubisoft be next on EA's [...]
February 26th, 2008 at 7:16 am
[...] jest to, że nie jest to jedyny adres, który EA zarejestrowała. GameCyte odkrył, że 22 lutego, na dwa dni przed ujawnieniem całej sprawy z Take-Two, firma nabyła [...]
February 26th, 2008 at 9:20 am
[...] a Take Two-style takeover bid for Ubisoft as its next potential expansion move. A poster by at Gamecyte noticed that a proxy registration for eaubisoft.com was set up by the same company on the same day [...]
February 26th, 2008 at 11:00 am
[...] EA and Ubisoft? [GameCyte] [...]
February 26th, 2008 at 1:37 pm
[...] stated that the company was “still considering” an EA acquisition earlier that year. GameCyte reports that the same proxy registration company that registered eatake2.com, a site used in an [...]
February 27th, 2008 at 5:47 am
[...] Link [...]
February 27th, 2008 at 8:34 am
[...] Bundle Announced New Terminator film set for May 2009 release | Entertainment | Film | Reuters EA and Ubisoft?|GameCyte __________________ My 2008 resolution: Survive the imminent zombie attack. GPG [...]
May 6th, 2008 at 10:26 pm
[...] clever folks over at GameCyte have noticed something rather odd about domains being registered…. as we just reported, EA [...]
October 16th, 2008 at 8:06 am
[...] a Take Two-style takeover bid for Ubisoft as its next potential expansion move. A poster over at Gamecyte noticed that a proxy registration for eaubisoft.com was set up by the same company on the same day [...]