Sony to pay $3.6 billion for Bungie acquisition of Destiny studio

Sony Interactive Entertainment Acquires Bungie; the two companies announced this on Monday. The studio is known for the Destiny franchise and put the Halo series on the map before that. The deal is said to be worth $3.6 billion.

Bungie announced the acquisition on its website. According to the studio, the team will continue to operate independently and nothing will change for Destiny 2 players: “We will continue to create and publish games independently, while striving for a unified community. Our games will remain available for the community, wherever they play.” Sony also emphasizes in its announcement that Bungie’s games will remain available on all current platforms.

The acquisition is notable not only because it is the second major acquisition in the games industry this month, but also because Bungie was under Microsoft from 2000 to 2007, where it developed the first Halo games for the Xbox. Bungie broke away from Microsoft in 2007. Between 2010 and 2019, Bungie had a deal with Activision Blizzard to publish Destiny, but that deal came to an end in 2019.

Sony would pay $3.6 billion for the acquisition of Bungie. This puts the acquisition in seventh place when it comes to the most expensive acquisitions in the games industry. Since the beginning of this month, the deal between Microsoft and Activision Blizzard has been number one.