The Swedish Embracer Group has been providing a lot for months negative headlines in the gaming industry. Studio closuressize Waves of layoffs and sales of companies and brands have marked a phase of restructuring. This realignment became necessary after the group got into financial difficulties due to a failed investor deal. The public mood towards the group is now correspondingly negative. A few years ago, Electronic Arts and Activision were the main enemies, but Embracer has now also catapulted itself into this ranks.
Now they are apparently daring to make a new beginning, in which the name Embracer will also disappear from public perception. CEO Lars Wingefors had only recently announced that the sale of Saber Interactive and Gearbox software The restructuring has been completed, but the biggest change for the company is yet to come. As the Swedish company announced in a press release on its own website, the group will be split into three independent companies in the foreseeable future. The three companies will be independent of each other and will each be listed as a separate publicly traded group on the Swedish NASDAQ.
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What does Embracer's new structure look like?
Asmodee: In the future, all activities on the analog games market will be brought together under the name of the French game publisher. So this is about board games, pen & paper role-playing games and the like. Asmodee owns 23 studios and more than 300 brands. These include well-known IPs such as Settlers of Catan, Ticket to Ride, Azul and many more. Additionally, Asmodee develops licensed games in the Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Marvel and Game of Thrones universes.
Coffee Stain & Friends: Coffee Stain is primarily a development studio for Goat Simulator and Satisfactory known. However, behind it is an entire holding company with various studios and publishing activities. This will now become Embracer's umbrella company for the indie and AA sectors. This company should take care of smaller game projects, but also free2play games with a high focus on continuous income. There should be separate Premium and Free2Play segments. In addition to Coffee Stain itself, the premium area will in future also include Ghost Ship, Tarsier, Tuxedo Labs, THQ Nordic and Amplifier Game Invest. The Free2Play area brings together studios such as Easybrain, Deca, CrazyLabs and Cryptic.
Middle-earth Enterprises and Friends: The third new sub-company will ultimately focus on the AAA games market. According to the name, supervision of the large area is also carried out here Lord of the Rings brand be located. This company's studios will include Crystal Dynamics, Eidos Montreal, Dambuster Studios, Flying Wild Hog Studios, Tripwire, Vertigo Games, Warhorse Studios and 4A Games. The German publisher Plaion and the comic publisher Dark Horse are also based here. In addition to the Lord of the Rings, Middle-earth Enterprises and Friends' well-known brands also include Tomb RaiderDead Island, Killing Floor, Kingdom Come: Deliverance and Metro.
What's next for Embracer?
The first step will be the spin-off of Asmodee, which will be listed as a separate company on the Swedish Stock Exchange within the next twelve months. The existing shareholders of Embracer are to receive corresponding shares of the new company as dividends. A similar procedure will be followed with the spin-off of Coffee Stain & Friends. The spin-off of the Indie/AA area should then be completed over the course of the 2025 calendar year. Whatever remains of Embracer Group after these two operations will then be renamed Middle-earth Enterprises and Friends.
Despite all this, Embracer founder Lars Wingefors remains the strong man at the top. As CEO of the entire group and major shareholder, he will also hold important reins in the three independent companies in the future. He also made this clear in an open letter in which he assured that he would remain invested in the Embracer Group companies for the long term. Wingefors each owns 20 percent of the company and 40 percent of the voting rights.