Bethesda Softworks Gets 150 Million Dollars for Development and Acquisitions

ZeniMax, the parent company of publisher Bethesda Softworks, which is best known for publishing the post apocalyptic role playing action hybrid Fallout 3, has received an investment of 150 million dollars from Providence Equity Partners, a private equity firm, with the stated aim of fueling both growth and video game development.

This comes after the more than 300 million dollars that ZeniMax received from the same equity firm in 2007, allowing it to expand its operations and fund the development of its latest titles.

It seems that Bethesda is interested in acquiring more independent developers in the coming years.

At the moment the company oversees the work of Bethesda Game Studios, working on franchises like Fallout and Elder Scrolls, id Software, creating the new intellectual property RAGE but also DOOM, and Arkane Studios, working on Arx Fatalis and Dark Messiah of Might and Magic, with ZeniMax Online being a separate division which is focused on MMO projects.

Michael Dominguez, who is a managing director at Providence, has stated, “Since our original investment in 2007, ZeniMax Media has tripled the size of its development portfolio and assembled an extraordinary library of major game franchises, along with some of the best development talent in the world.”

Robert A. Altman, the founder of ZeniMax, says, “Though a number of prominent private equity firms offered to invest with us on attractive terms, we chose Providence as they have proved to be an ideal partner for us over the past three years as we built our business.”

The next big release for Bethesda is the Obsidian created Fallout: New Vegas, which uses the same basic structure as the previous game in the series and take the player West, to the city of gambling, putting him in the middle of a conflict between the New California Republic and Caesar's Legion.

Obsidian, as an independent developer, could an acquisition target for ZeniMax.