You gotta believe in yourself
In one way, Electronic Arts has always sort of been the New York Yankees of videogames — it simply buys what it wants. Many of the studios in EA’s stable — such as PopCap and BioWare — weren’t home-grown, but rather bought through expensive acquisitions. Company CFO Blake Jorgensen’s looking to change that.
Speaking with GamesIndustry, Jorgensen cited the publisher’s hit/miss history as a big reason why. “I think our history with acquisitions is somewhat marginal in performance. We have some that are spectacular, and some that didn’t do so well,” he said. As far as Jorgensen figures, there are better things EA could do with its money.
One of the uses of its capital that EA’s considering is to buy back as much of its stock as possible. This is typically portrayed as a company “investing in itself.” It also serves to increase value for shareholders, as it reduces the amount of shares on the market. Conveniently, news of a buyback usually causes stock prices to shoot up.
With regard to development know-how, Jorgensen thinks that EA has all that it needs right under its nose. “I’m also a huge believer that we’ve got great opportunities inside our organization,” he commented. “We’ve built a really strong bench of talent at all levels, and our view is just [to] find great ideas, either through our own development or through licensed IP, and leverage your talent base to try to build that.”
EA not looking for big acquisitions [GamesIndustry]
