Raw Fury announced today that the private equity firm Altor has agreed to acquire a majority stake in the Swedish publisher.
“It’s very much business as usual for us. We’ll operate autonomously and continue trying to be a catalyst for positive change in our corner of the industry,” Raw Fury founder Jonas Antonsson told GamesBeat. “We’ve gone through this sort of transition before with previous investments, and our own history shows that we’ve been able to maintain our core beliefs of treating humans like humans and making sure developers feel like equal partners. These ideals are definitely not going away. We’re the first foray into the games business for Altor, their confidence in us to lead by action and leave us to our own devices is absolutely welcomed by us.”
Past funding for Raw Fury includes $5.5 million from Nordisk Film Games in 2018. We don’t know how much this majority stake cost Altor, but Antonsson did jokingly tell GamesBeat it is “enough for a second volcano lair.”
“Some of the leftover funds we’ll use to grow at a steady rate over the next few years,” Antonsson said. “We’ll also raise the amount we can contribute to new publishing projects, we want to take on larger budget titles but we’ll also continue to seek, publish, and push forward experimental titles and artistic endeavors.”
Acquisitions and investments in the gaming industry have been ramping up in the past couple of years as companies look to spend money instead of letting it languish in banks with flat interest rates. Just look at Microsoft and the myriad of studios it has acquired lately, including Bethesda. In the first half of 2021, 24 crypto and blockchain gaming companies closed investments valued at $476 million.
Raw Fury started in 2016 and has published notable indie games like Dandara and the upcoming Sable, which releases on September 23. The company has over 60 employees combined in its publishing and development studios.