Video game development requires a lot of money. Sometimes a studio can get its own funding, but this often requires investment from a third party, including publishers. But publishers are large companies subject to the whims of their investors. Sometimes an entity invests so much in a publisher and owns so much of its stock that it essentially owns the company.
The Public Investment Fund (PIF) is a branch of the Saudi government that has been on the lips of gamers for several years. This wealth fund was created to improve the country’s economic portfolio, and it accomplished this task by creating businesses and investing in others. Although PIF’s portfolio covers a wide range of industries and most of these organizations are located in the Middle East, PIF has diversified to invest in many foreign companies. In fact, some of the PIF’s biggest and most impactful spending has been on video game studios and publishers. Many of PIF’s investments in the gaming sector are made through its gaming subsidiary, Savvy Games Group.
We’ve compiled a list of all the game publishers and other game-affiliated organizations that the PIF owns, listed in order of stock. Given that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz is the chairman of the PIF, it is by no means an exaggeration to say that Saudi Arabia owns these companies. However, given the speed at which the PIF is evolving, don’t be surprised if this article becomes obsolete in the near future.
Esports Foundation
Many studios want to create the next big esports title. You can’t ask for better marketing than seeing millions of spectators cheering on a team of professional gamers playing the game you created. Although esports championships have been around longer than PIF, the company has created one of the biggest names in this sub-industry.
The Esports World Cup is an annual competition that began in 2024. Each event attracts thousands of players from around the world, all chasing fame, glory, and tens of millions of dollars in prize money. Hundreds of millions of viewers follow the competition, which covers a wide variety of titles, so the Esports World Cup is by no means a small affair.
Although the Esports World Cup has several partners, including Sony, Lenovo Legion and Secret Lab, the competition is the brainchild of PIF and is part of the country’s plan to make Saudi Arabia a mecca for gaming and esports. With the exception of 2026, every annual tournament has been held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (the 2026 cup was held in Paris, France), and organizers plan to return to Riyadh for the 2027 tournament. However, many people have accused the esports cup of being what CNN calls “sportswashing”: using a sporting event to fake a preferable image in order to distract from potential human rights violations. man and other problems. These critiques are a recurring theme among all PIF investments.
EA
EA is a controversial company at the best of times. What else can you expect from a publisher that puts ads in even its most expensive AAA titles? For many audiences, EA is synonymous with the downfall of beloved studios such as Visceral (“Dead Space”) and Westwood (“Command & Conquer”). EA is also now the face of Saudi Arabia.
On August 4, 2026, EA announced that it had been acquired by the “Consortium” (a partnership between PIF and investment companies Silver Lake and Affinity Partners). According to the BBC, the sale totaled around $55 billion, making it one of the most expensive leveraged buyouts in history. Of course, PIF only invested $36 billion for the acquisition and borrowed the rest from JPMorgan. But Saudi Arabia will not have to repay this debt; in accordance with the acquisition agreement, this responsibility rests with EA.
Before the PIF (and the rest of the Consortium) acquired all of EA, Saudi Arabia already had its hand in EA’s pie. The PIF has held minority stakes in EA for years. Initially, the wealth fund held 16.01 million shares, but in 2023, this figure increased to 24.81 million shares. And now a Saudi-led conglomerate owns all the shares. Many gamers were concerned about the acquisition, mainly about how Saudi Arabia would affect EA games in the future. That, and because Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, founded Affinity Partners.
Scope
We live in an age of monopolies. Microsoft owns companies like Zenimax and LinkedIn, while Corsair owns manufacturers like Scuf Gaming and Elgato. Today, the quickest way to build a game catalog is to buy the companies that published games and, subsequently, the companies that bought those companies.
In July 2023, Savvy Games Group completed its purchase of Scopely for $4.9 billion. Even if you haven’t heard of Scopely, you probably know (and may have played) the games it has. Most of Scopely’s “original” titles are licensed properties turned into mobile games, including “Monopoly Go!” “, “Scrabble Go” and “Star Trek Fleet Command”, and many of these games were developed not by Scopely but by the studios it acquired. However, Scopely is perhaps best (or worst) known for its acquisition of one of the most successful mobile studios of all time.
On March 12, 2025, Scopely announced plans to purchase Niantic, the studio behind “Pokémon GO” and “Monster Hunter Now.” The deal was finalized in May 2025 and Niantic was subsequently renamed Scopely Explore. Since Savvy Games Group owned Scopely at the time, these titles are now part of Saudi Arabia’s video game ambitions.
SNK
Property in the legal world is a confusing subject. You don’t actually need to acquire a lock, stock and barrel of business to own it; you just need to have a larger stake than everyone else who has invested in the organization combined.
As with EA, Saudi has owned shares of SNK (the company best known for the “Fatal Fury” franchise) for several years, just under a different name. In 2020, the Saudi crown prince’s foundation, Electronic Gaming Development Company (EGDC), acquired a 33.3% stake in SNK and signed a deal that promised to eventually increase that stake to 51%. Fast forward to 2022, and EGDC has purchased enough SNK stock to own over 96% of the company, making EGDC the owner of SNK.
This particular purchase marked the first time that EGDC – and, by extension, Saudi Arabia – had acquired a foreign games studio. When VGC asked SNK for comment on the event, the company’s lead producer and designer Yasuyuki Oda promised that SNK still had “full freedom” in creative aspects, although the public protested in response, usually in the form of a boycott of SNK games and any streams associated with SNK properties. However, that didn’t stop Capcom from adding the main face of “Fatal Fury,” Mai Shiranui, as a DLC guest character in “Street Fighter 6.”
Minority issues
Increasing share ownership percentage is a recurring theme among game studio purchases in Saudi Arabia. First, the fund enters these companies by purchasing minority stakes. Then a few years later, she dove headlong into homeownership. Although PIF has yet to announce any major developer purchases at the time of writing, Saudi Arabia still holds its hand in several major stock libraries.
Arguably the biggest purchase in Saudi Arabia’s portfolio is a fraction of Nintendo. In 2022, PIF purchased 5% of Nintendo shares, which was later increased to 8.26% in 2023, but now stands at almost 4.23% at the time of writing. Although this partial ownership is a pittance compared to Saudi Arabia’s other purchases, it remains the largest external stakeholder in the Nintendo PIF. Earlier in 2026, EGDC purchased 5.03% of Capcom’s shares, while PIF transferred its 11 million shares of Take-Two Interactive to Savvy Games Group, demonstrating Saudi Arabia’s aggressive push into the gaming sector.
The above investments are just a sample of the companies the PIF invests in, but they are not the only methods Saudi Arabia uses to expand its economic portfolio. While not a monetary investment in the same sense, Roblox is partnering with Saudi Arabia to establish a new regional headquarters in Riyadh, primarily to support the Saudi creative community. Given Roblox’s recent partnership with Savvy Games Group to turn the game “Roblox” into an educational tool for Saudi students, don’t be surprised if PIF buys shares of Roblox (and later acquires the company) in the near future.
