The two companies together own 30.34% of the Japanese studio’s shares.

Kadokawa Corporation, the parent company of FromSoftware, has announced that Sixjoy Hong Kong, owned by Tencent Holdings, and Sony Interactive Entertainment, owned by Sony Group, have acquired a substantial block of shares in FromSoftware, which most recently made a standout game with Elden Ring. Tencent acquired 16.25% and Sony 14.09% of mg’s shares, but the most significant shareholder remains Kadokawa Corporation (which retains the entire remainder, 69.66%).

According to the announcement, “The Kadokawa Group advocates a “global media mix with technology” as its fundamental strategy that combines the stable creation of intellectual property (IP) consisting of a variety of portfolio content chiefly in the Publication, Video, Game, Web Service, and Education businesses as well as the rollout of this IP on a global scale through the extended use of technology, seeking to achieve sustained growth and enhance corporate value from medium- to long term perspectives. FromSoftware is driving the Game Business as it has continually created world-famous works like Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice and Elden Ring, leveraging its advanced game IP development strength. With an eye on further expansion of the Game Business, the Group recognizes the enhancement of capabilities for creating, developing and deploying game IP as one of the Group’s highest priorities. In line with this policy, the Company has decided to have FromSoftware implement fund procurement by way of a Third-Party Allotment to Sixjoy and SIE, the scheduled allottees, for the reasons outlined below.

Tencent acquired capital in Guangzhou Tianwen Kadokawa Animation and Comics Co., Ltd., a consolidated subsidiary of the Company, in 2016. The two companies have jointly promoted their media mix strategy targeting the Chinese market. In addition, the Company, Sixjoy and Tencent Japan entered a capital and business alliance agreement as of October 2021 to strengthen their strategic alliance in the anime and game fields. Tencent and its subsidiaries and affiliates (from now on, the “Tencent Group”) are a global Internet group that provides communication, social, gaming, digital content, advertising, fintech and cloud services and operates the leading communication and social platform in the Internet industry in China. Sony and its subsidiaries (from now on, the “Sony Group”) and the Company have developed a collaborative business relationship across a wide range of areas related to the Sony Group’s global Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) business operations, branded hardware business and games business. In February 2021, the Company conducted a third-party allotment with Sony as the allottee to strengthen its relationship with the Sony Group over the long term, creating new IP for the Company and maximizing the utilization of its existing IP in anime and game fields.

Through the implementation of the fund procurement, FromSoftware will proactively invest in developing a more powerful game IP for itself to strengthen FromSoftware’s development capabilities and will seek to establish a framework that expands the scope of its publishing in the significantly growing global market. In addition to these purposes, to increase the number of users in the global market for game IP that FromSoftware creates and develops, FromSoftware decided to conduct the Third-Party Allotment to Sixjoy within the Tencent Group, which has strength in its capabilities to create and deploy mobile games and other network technologies in the global market including China, and SIE within the Sony Group, which has strength in its capabilities to deploy IP in games, videos and various other media in the global market, concurrently and separately.”

In short, the point is that with Tencent, the Chinese and mobile expansion could be realized. In contrast, with Sony, in addition to the anime involvement, the development and self-publishing option could be recognized for FromSoftware.

Source: Gematsu