EA’s new owners reportedly eye 25 billion dollar Unity takeover

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund and the American investment firm Silver Lake, the two parties that bought Electronic Arts, may now also want to buy the game engine maker Unity. According to the Dutch tech site Tweakers, which cites reporting by Reuters, the deal would be worth 25 billion dollars, although none of the parties involved has confirmed the rumour.

What happened

Tweakers reported on 6 November 2026 that the Public Investment Fund (PIF), Saudi Arabia’s state investment fund, and Silver Lake are in talks about a possible takeover of Unity Software. The story is based on Reuters, which says people involved told it the talks have taken place. Tweakers stresses that the companies have not confirmed any of this, so for now it remains a rumour.

Silver Lake already has a foothold in the company. Tweakers reports that the firm owns 8 percent of Unity Software’s shares. If a takeover went through, Unity could leave the stock market and be owned entirely by the investment firm and the Saudi government.

The company matters a great deal to the games industry. Tweakers describes Unity as the second largest game engine in the world after Unreal Engine, and says it may even have the most individual games built on it. The engine is used very widely for smartphone games and by independent and smaller studios. A game engine is the software that developers use to build a game, so a change in who owns it can affect thousands of products at once.

The same two buyers were in the news at the end of 2025, when they bought Electronic Arts for 55 billion dollars. Tweakers notes that much of that deal was paid for with borrowed money, which left the company with a large debt from the start. Shortly after the takeover, several hundred employees lost their jobs, and several studios were reportedly set to close.

The size of the Unity deal puts it among the largest the industry has seen. According to Tweakers, the EA purchase was the biggest games acquisition ever after Microsoft’s purchase of Activision Blizzard. At 25 billion dollars, a Unity takeover would be the third largest.

Why it matters if you live in the Netherlands

Tweakers does not report any effect that applies only to the Netherlands. Still, the details it gives point to a few groups of people who should pay attention, wherever they are based.

If you play games on your phone, there is a good chance some of them run on Unity. Tweakers says the engine is used on a very large scale for smartphone games. A change of owner would not change those games overnight, but the people who decide on Unity’s direction, pricing and investment would be different.

If you work in games, or are moving to the Netherlands to do so, the story is more direct. Tweakers says Unity is widely used by independent and smaller studios. Those studios depend on the engine and on the company behind it. A Unity that is no longer listed on the stock market would also share less public information about its plans and finances than it does as a listed company.

The EA example is also relevant to workers. Tweakers links that takeover to heavy borrowing, a large debt, several hundred job losses and planned studio closures soon after the deal was completed. Nothing in the report says the same would happen at Unity, but anyone working at Unity or relying on it for their income will note how the last deal by the same buyers played out.

Consumers and voters who follow questions about foreign state ownership may also take an interest. Tweakers states plainly that, after a deal, Unity could be fully owned by an investment firm and the Saudi government. With EA already in the same hands, the Saudi state fund would hold a stake in one of the world’s largest game publishers and one of its most widely used engines.

What to watch next

The first thing to watch is whether any of the parties confirms the talks. So far, according to Tweakers, PIF, Silver Lake and Unity have not responded to the rumours. A formal offer or a statement from Unity’s board would be the clearest sign that the deal is real.

The second is how any deal would be paid for. Borrowed money played a large part in the EA purchase, and Tweakers ties that to the debt and job cuts that followed. If a Unity deal is announced, how much of it relies on debt will say a lot about the pressure the company might face afterwards.

The third is what happens to Unity’s place on the stock market. Tweakers reports that the company could be taken private. That would change how much the public, developers and investors can see of its decisions.

Developers who build on Unity, and players who simply enjoy the games made with it, have no reason to act yet. A takeover of this size would take time, and for now the report rests on unnamed sources speaking to Reuters. Mylistingo will follow the story as it develops.

Source: Tweakers