Games services and software giant Keywords Studio has acquired US developer High Voltage Software.
The Chicago-based firm has been snapped up for $50 million. High Voltage was founded back in 1993 and has contributed to more than 100 games, including Fortnite and entries in the Saints Row and Mortal Kombat series.
Founder Kerry Ganofsky is going to be staying on to lead the studio.
"With its 27-year pedigree of game development in the global video games market, High Voltage brings incredible experience, expertise and additional scale to our fast-growing Game Development Service Line," Keywords CEO Andrew Day (pictured) said.
"The multitalented team at HVS brings deep expertise in the Unreal Game Engine development environment, honed particularly well in recent years through working closely with Epic Games on Fortnite, as well as a track record of having worked with many client proprietary game engines, gaming platforms and game genres, which all adds further breadth and depth to Keywords Studios’ existing capabilities. It also adds a new presence in Chicago, and in New Orleans, for the Group, providing access to an additional pool of talent. I am very pleased indeed to welcome Kerry and the crew at HVS to the Keywords Studios family and look forward to enabling their continued growth as part of the Group.”
Ganofsky added: “We are overjoyed to join an industry-leading global group such as Keywords Studios. We are tremendously excited they share our vision for augmenting our development capabilities and they will provide us the ability to embark upon a growth trajectory for our business creating the next generation of AAA games. Furthermore, Keywords Studios’ investment in our studio is an outstanding sign for the continued expansion of game development in Illinois and Louisiana. We genuinely look forward to working together with everyone at Keywords Studios and fulfilling a noteworthy role in this new journey with them.”
This comes in the wake of Keywords buying LA-based marketing firm Gnet last month, as well as Heavy Iron Studios in September and Coconut Lizard in June.
