Company News Back-door stock market listing for CD Projekt?

[DarkUnderlord]

Tags: CD Projekt; Witcher, The

<a href="http://polygamia.pl/Polygamia/1,95338,7100848,Optimus_kupi_CD_Projekt_.html">So the poles @ polygamia are reporting</a>. Thankfully this foreign language news has an English version:
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<blockquote>As we managed to find out, CD Projekt, the developer of The Witcher and owner of digital distribution platform Good Old Games is to be bought by the nearly defunct public company, Optimus S.A., specializing in assembly of PCs. Optimus is paying with its own shares, to be owned by the current owners of CD Projekt, so in reality it is a way for CD Projekt, a privately owned company, to enter the stock market without the necessary formalities. The companies have signed a letter of intent today, and since Optimus is public, official information should appear soon.</blockquote>
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Interplay Mk II. Assumably CD Projekt are doing it as a way to get necessary funding.
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Thanks <b>Ausir</b>!

 

[WhiskeyWolf]

This is quite surprising... or rather disturbing when I think about it. "Optimus" the masters of tax dodging and bankruptcy. The hell were they thinking?

 

[Burning Bridges]

This only proves the old law: For any company making RPGs, quality and chance of survival are inversely proportional.

 

[Wyrmlord]

A private company paid with shares becomes a publicly listed company on Poland? Wha?

Meanwhile, no sane investor puts his money in a speculative venture like videogames.

 

[WhiskeyWolf]

CD Projekt enters the stock market through a back door
The company signed a letter of intent with Optimus. The agreement will look similar as with the cooperation between Optimus and Work Service, senator Tomasz Misiak's company.
Optimus will buy 100% of the whole CD Projekt Investment group, paying with its own shares, and de facto it's the shareholders of CD Projekt that will be the owners of the new company, entering the Warsaw stock market over the ruins of Optimus.
The Optimus management negotiated a deal with CD Projekt before, but it signed a letter of intent with Work Service in July. Both parties broke the agreement several days ago. Then CD Projekt returned to the table.

Ha, thought so. After that tax stunt in 2007 "Optimus" was only a corpse. As you can see in reality it's the other way around, CDP is "buying" Optimus to get to the stock market.

 

[thesheeep]

a speculative venture like videogames.

Ahahahaha, I hope you don't really believe this

 

[Monocause]

I hope that guys from CDP thought this through. Optimus has proven numerous times that it's a complete mess of a business partner. Frankly, I'm surprised that the company still exists.

I'd say it's a bad idea.

http://www.bankier.pl/inwestowanie/prof ... =5Y&size=B

Here's how Optimus shares look now, from August 2004. It's highly doubtful that CDP acquisition would improve the brand's reputation. We don't know all the details, but the way it looks now it could mean CDP's downfall.

 

[Ausir]

Some new details about the transaction:

http://polygamia.pl/Polygamia/1,101109, ... _nowe.html

 

[aries202]

As I understand this, CD Project will become the owner of Optimus, not the other way around? since Optimus will give CD Project shares which CDP then will use to pay for Optimus? And is this even legal?

It looks to me like CDP will call the shots, decide over Optimus, not Optimus deciding over CDP.

 

[Ausir]

Actually, it turns out that only half of Optimus will now be owned by the current owners of CDP - the other half will be owned by the two main shareholders of Optimus.

 

[WhiskeyWolf]

Actually, it turns out that only half of Optimus will now be owned by the current owners of CDP - the other half will be owned by the two main shareholders of Optimus.

Now this is bad.

 

[J1M]

Getting listed as a public company means pressure to make shareholders happy and meet quarterly objectives. It's really stupid unless you are just looking to cash in on a spike in share value.

 

[Elwro]

I thought their idea was to get external funding for TW 2.

 

[Frau Bishop]

I thought their idea was to get filthy rich.

Oh, smashing, groovy, yay capitalism!

 

[DarkUnderlord]

• For the rest of the CDP shares, Optimus will pay 14 million zlotys.
  
  "We have tried to find a way of entering the stock market for several months, in order to develop further and to more easily acquire capital for producing games, without being at the mercy of Western publishers."
  
  According to the agreement, Optimus is to raise the share capital, acquire a bank credit of 9 million złotys and loan 10 million złotys to CD Projekt.

CD Projekt just raised $5M USD to develop Witcher 2. I suspect this was the best offer they had on the table and would've fallen over without it.

Yay Optimus! Yay to the Herve Caen of Poland!

 

[Burning Bridges]

This does not sound good, probably CDP will never see the money. all rpgs are fail.

 

[OldSkoolKamikaze­[FAKE]]

Bye bye CDP.

 

[Severian Silk]

"Optimus Projekt"

Sounds better to me.

Since they're already into digital distribution, maybe they will start making cheap hardware that downloads and plays old DOS/Win games?