Mergers and acquisitions

Bloomberg is reporting that Saber Interactive, the developers reportedly working on a remake of Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, is being sold by Embracer Group to a private investment group. Embracer Group has been going through a massive restructuring that has seen hundreds of employees laid off and the shuttering of studios. This latest deal appears to be another part of that ongoing effort. While the state of the Knights of the Old Republic remake is currently in question, Saber Interactive is slated to…

Customers visit the Macy's Herald Square store in New York City on Dec. 17, 2023.Kena Betancur | Corbis News | Getty ImagesInvestment firm Arkhouse Management has launched a proxy fight at Macy's, nominating a slate of nine directors for election to the department store's board.Macy's on Tuesday confirmed that it had received notice of the nominations from Arkhouse, which made an unsolicited $21-a-share bid for the company in December. Macy's board rejected that $5.8 billion offer and questioned the status of Arkhouse's…

FairMoney, a digital bank based in Lagos and headquartered in Paris, is in discussions to acquire Umba, a credit-led digital bank providing payroll and financial services to customers in Nigeria and Kenya, in a $20 million all-stock deal, sources tell TechCrunch. The move signals FairMoney’s interest in growing its customer base by expanding into more countries, specifically Kenya. But it also underscores the challenges facing fintechs in Africa amid a challenging market for startups globally: a $20 million…

Broadcasting company Sinclair recently sold off its free, ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) service STIRR to Thinking Media, a startup that provides cloud-based streaming solutions for FAST and over-the-top (OTT) services. The new owners have ambitious plans for the streamer, including an international expansion, tripling its on-demand content library and becoming an AI-native streamer with advanced search capabilities. Cord Cutters News broke the news of the deal, which officially closed two weeks ago. The…

Smart water bottle-maker Larq this week announced that it has been acquired by filtration giant, Brita. More specifically, Brita GmbH, the German company founded in 1966, which spun off and sold its North/South American wing to Clorox in 1988. Brita GmbH maintains the brand in the rest of the world, but it currently is barred from selling products under its own brand name in the Americas. Among other things, this acquisition provides the corporation a clear reentry point into the former market under an existing — if…

The Mattel Inc. logo is displayed outside the headquarters of the toy company known for products including Barbie and Hot Wheels in El Segundo, California, on June 8, 2023.Patrick T. Fallon | AFP | Getty ImagesActivist investor Barington Capital is pushing Mattel to consider selling off its American Girl and Fisher-Price brands, citing underperformance within the divisions.Mattel shares were up around 3% in premarket trading Friday following a letter sent to Mattel Thursday, which was first reported by the Wall Street…

It appears that developer Tokyo RPG Factory will be merging into Square Enix. According to Gematsu, as part of an absorption-type merger, Square Enix will inherit all assets and liabilities of Tokyo RPG Factory and the subsidiary will be dissolved and cease to exist. The company was established back in June 2015 as a Square Enix subsidiary to develop I am Setsuna and would go on to also develop Lost Sphear and Oninaki. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5QYlzCokJY JRPG Developer since 2015 Tokyo RPG Factory released…

Byron Allen, founder, chairman and CEO of the Allen Media Group, speaks during the Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills, California, on May 2, 2022.Patrick T. Fallon | AFP | Getty ImagesByron Allen, the media mogul offering $14 billion for Paramount Global, told CNBC on Wednesday that he has the money to finance a deal, despite skepticism around his deal-making."We have more than enough capital available to us. The real challenge is certainty of close," Allen said."This deal lives or dies at the ," he…

When HPE announced its intention to acquire Juniper Networks for $14 billion in cold, hard cash earlier this month, it was a bit of a shock. Sure, HP had already bought Aruba in 2015 for around $3 billion. Grabbing another networking company would presumably just add another layer to that business. Of course, there are always complications incorporating one large organization into another, and HP doesn’t exactly have the best record for being a smooth operator where that’s concerned over the years. But surprisingly,…

Burger King fast food restaurant with menu and customers.Jeff Greenberg | Universal Images Group | Getty ImagesRestaurant Brands International is buying Carrols Restaurant Group, the largest Burger King franchisee in the U.S., for about $1 billion in cash.Restaurant Brands will pay $9.55 per share to acquire Carrols, which operates more than 1,000 Burger King restaurants and 60 Popeyes locations. Carrols' stock closed at $8.42 on Friday, giving it a market value of $459 million. The company's shares closed up 12% on…