|
|
|
|
|
 Email+  Share+
Collins sells stake in Jolt games
08 November 2009 By Ian Kehoe
Gaming entrepreneur Dylan Collins has sold a majority stake in his Jolt Online Gaming to GameStop, the world’s largest video game retailer, in a multimillion-euro deal.
While terms of the deal have not been disclosed, the games retailer plans to invest up to €20 million in Jolt over the coming two to three years. Collins, the founder and chief executive of Jolt, will retain a significant minority stake in the firm and will continue to head the business.
Collins could not be reached for comment last week.
Established last year, Jolt has developed a portfolio of so-called ‘persistent browser games’ – video games that are played over the internet, rather than on traditional consoles. The company now has more than two million registered customers.
Jolt has been in negotiations with GameStop for a number of months, and the deal was finally agreed last week. A formal announcement by GameStop is expected in the coming days to coincide with a briefing of industry analysts.
Under the terms of the deal, Jolt will continue to be based in Ireland, and GameStop will commit between €15 million and €20 million to develop the company. The deal is likely to lead to a large number of new jobs.
Backed by Enterprise Ireland and a number of private investors, Jolt has expanded rapidly over the past year. The company has established operations in Dublin, Los Angeles and Delhi, and has signed deals with a number of games publishers around the world.
Collins previously founded Demonware, a video game software company that was sold to US gaming giant Activision for around €10 million. A number of former Demonware investors are also shareholders of Jolt.
GameStop has 6,100 stores in 18 countries, including 59 in Ireland and Britain. It has annual revenues of about $12 billion and wants to build Jolt into the number one player in the online video game market, which is growing at about 15 per cent a year.
|
|
|
