The maker of Plants vs. Zombies and Bejeweled, Pop Cap Games has been sold to Electronic Arts for $1.3 Billion.
EA said that they will pay $650 million in cash and $100 million in EA shares for PopCap, with additional payments if the game maker meets certain performance thresholds.
The company had roughly $100 million in revenue last year and was profitable, according to PopCap executives. EA said the deal will help accelerate the company’s strategy to shift more of its business to high-growth digital sources of game revenue.
The Wall Street Journal said that to receive a maximum performance payout of $550 million, the deal requires PopCap to reach $343 million or more in earnings before interest and taxes in its own business for the two years ending in December 2013.
Under the deal, PopCap will receive smaller performance payments for achieving lower financial targets, including nothing if its earnings before interest and taxes for 2012 and 2013 are $91 million or less. Founded over 10 years ago, Seattle-based PopCap has produced a string of hit “casual” games, which also include Peggle, Bookworm and Zuma, that are popular on PCs, mobile devices like the iPad and Facebook Inc.’s social network.
