Do not anticipate Pokémon Go 2 any time quickly.
“I believe that doing a sequel inside a franchise is fairly clearly not the right factor to do,” says Ed Wu, Scopely’s president of video games and former SVP of Pokémon Go at Niantic.
“There’s such a big neighborhood due to the way in which that our video games will be part of people’s lives wherever they go, nevertheless they discover the world. Making a sequel that divides the neighborhood does not make as a lot sense. If and once we do one thing new, it can actually should be from a special angle, but nonetheless with this notion of inspiring individuals to discover the world collectively.”
Pokémon Go is undoubtedly the jewel in Niantic’s crown. The situation-based monster catcher is closing in on its tenth anniversary, and has been downloaded greater than 500 million occasions, producing over $8.8 billion in income in line with AppMagic estimates.
But it surely’s not the one big title in Niantic’s portfolio, which additionally contains video games like Pikmin Bloom and Monster Hunter Now – all of which have been acquired by Monopoly Go maker Scopely in Might 2025, in a deal price $3.5 billion.
Scopely is a subsidiary of Savvy Video games Group, which in flip is the video video games division of Saudi Arabia’s Public Funding Fund (PIF). Final September, the PIF was a part of a consortium that entered into an settlement to purchase Digital Arts – it can allegedly personal greater than 93% of EA if the acquisition is profitable.
Now, as Scopely celebrates the primary anniversary of its acquisition of Niantic Video games, GamesIndustry.biz caught up with the agency to learn the way the landmark deal took place, how Niantic has been built-in into Scopely, and what the long run holds.
A great match
Wu says that the acquisition deal emerged from conversations between executives at Scopely and Niantic over the course of a number of years. The 2 companies realised that they would be a good fit for each other.
“We actually noticed eye to eye with this deep concentrate on neighborhood,” says Wu.
“Each firms make cellular video games, but they recognise that cellular video games usually are not simply code. They’re basically a compact between the event group that builds them and a neighborhood that surrounds them. That is why these video games can have the form of lasting energy and longevity of not simply months or years, but a long time.”
A big portion of Niantic’s success has been with licensed properties, mainly Pokémon, Pikmin, and Monster Hunter (though Harry Potter title Wizards Unite did not take and shut down in 2022). A reliance on licenses relatively than owned IP is usually seen as a weak spot within the mergers and acquisitions (M&A) market, but Scopely’s VP and international head of M&A ops, Heather Tacskovics, argues that the corporate considered this enterprise focus as a power.
“Scopely actually is an organization based on beloved IP,” she says. “It already felt very a lot in our wheelhouse and actually, the other of a danger. It is one thing we thought was an important asset, as a result of we have actually seen the ability of this IP. We could not have a greater match when it comes to this enduring beloved IP getting used within the sport in a manner that is such an important match. I’d say it might be the other of a danger and one of many options that was very interesting to us.”
Scopely solely bought Niantic’s video games arm; the tech aspect of the enterprise was spun out as Niantic Spatial. The latter stored maintain of two video games – Ingress and Peridot – though in April, Niantic Spatial introduced Peridot might be closing down later this year.
Niantic Spatial was arrange with $250 million in funding; $200 million of this was from Niantic, with Scopely investing $50 million. The Savvy-owned agency felt that having a video games enterprise and a tech enterprise under the identical umbrella was doing each a disservice.
“It is terribly troublesome for a corporation the dimensions of Niantic to have primarily two enterprise focuses and two clients in thoughts on the similar time, a B2B enterprise and a B2C enterprise,” Wu explains.
Tacskovics provides: “We’re a video games firm. We are the No.1 cellular video games firm within the US. That is the core of what we wish to proceed being, so bringing over the video games actually made essentially the most sense for us. Being these two issues inside one firm was not essentially serving the best goal for all concerned. It is troublesome to actually be a video games firm, or actually be a expertise and analysis firm when you’re under one umbrella. It was the perfect of all worlds for us to actually keep true to ourselves and solely purchase the video games a part of the enterprise.”
Niantic Video games and Niantic Spatial do not seem to have a lot of a relationship, both; Wu says that they’ve accomplished their greatest to “separate as cleanly as doable”.
“It is vital for each side to concentrate on their respective missions,” he says.
Acquisitions and integration
Scopely is a big participant within the video games trade and is always maintaining a tally of the marketplace for potential acquisitions. In 2025, Tacskovics says that the Monopoly Go large spoke to 800 potential companions, which permits the corporate to actually perceive what makes firms enticing, on prime of the standard fundamentals and key efficiency indicators.
“For us, one actually constructive signal is cultural match,” she explains. “These are going to be your working companions, we hope eternally. You actually wish to ensure that these are individuals which you could work along with, that there is going to be good collaboration. By way of options of a enterprise, we’re in it for the long run. We’re not trying to churn out short-term hits. We actually need individuals which might be in that long-term operator mindset of being actually participant centric and having enduring video games. It is these issues which might be actually constructive indicators.
“We additionally wish to perceive how we will be higher collectively. What is the level of coming collectively? What is the level of becoming a member of forces? What can we convey to the desk? Now we have some nice central expertise at Scopely referred to as Playgami. That may actually convey a variety of analytics and insights to the desk as nicely. How can we leverage these? Would we be higher if we joined forces, and in that case, how? Are we aligned on that? These are all actually constructive indicators that this might be a extremely fruitful partnership.”
In addition to serving to to instigate and shut M&A, the opposite aspect of Tacskovics’ function is how to make sure that newly bought firms are built-in as painlessly as doable into Scopely. In an effort to do that in a manner that minimises disruption, she says that there must be a “basis of understanding” on each side of the desk earlier than shut to determine “culturally what’s vital to individuals.” Though she provides that there is no set formulation, and that she prefers a “strategic and customised method” for every new addition.
“It was particularly important that we did nothing disruptive to that enterprise”
Heather Tacskovics
“In a scenario like [Niantic], the place it is primarily a carve out, you additionally want to know the place there’s going to be gaps left, as a result of they weren’t functioning as two separate companies,” she continues. “There was some complexity round that. There is no examine record the place we are saying we at all times do these particular issues, jam it collectively and we’re good to go. That is usually the place you see the wheels fall off. It is about asking what a enterprise wants.” At across the time of the deal, there have been a small variety of layoffs at Niantic Spatial, which had beforehand been announced in March 2025, but Scopely didn’t make any layoffs at Niantic Video games after the acquisition.
The deal closed in peak dwell occasion season for Pokémon Go, which added additional stress to proceedings.
“It was particularly important that we did nothing disruptive to that enterprise,” Tacskovics continues. “Taking the time to know what’s vital to the enterprise, what obligations they’ve, how we are able to help to ensure that they’ll proceed to be so profitable and function seamlessly after which collaborating collectively on these factors. Every part was accomplished in collaboration with Niantic versus one thing that was simply selected the Scopely aspect.”
The long run
Wu says that being a part of Scopely has been a “large breath of recent air” that has allowed the corporate to look additional into the long run.
“Now we have felt constrained in some ways when it comes to the horizon that we are able to look out on for at the least a few years now as we have gone via the acquisition course of,” he says. “That meant we have been at all times trying to the following week, the following quarter. With the ability to breathe on this oxygen permits us to look a lot additional into the gap – greater than 5 years, a decade plus – and have a look at what would we wish to turn out to be, what would we wish to proceed to do.
“We actually do consider within the capability of expertise to encourage individuals to discover the world collectively. Bringing that to a whole bunch of hundreds of thousands extra individuals globally is each our calling in addition to nice enterprise prerogative. There’s a lot that we are able to do there. There’s so many markets which might be rising and growing all world wide, and new generations of persons are coming into our video games.”
Initially, Wu desires to develop the viewers. Second, he desires to take a look at new expertise and new potential companions. “We’re fascinated about the following form of experiences we are able to create,” he says. “But at all times with this concentrate on inspiring individuals to discover the world collectively.”