Things are very, very bad: analysts no longer doubt Ubisoft's imminent bankruptcy
In recent months, the already precarious situation of the French game publisher Ubisoft has critically deteriorated: the share price is plummeting, games are selling poorly, there is not enough money to cover expenses, and almost 20,000 employees are under the threat of dismissal.
Family Guillemot (owners of Ubisoft) Media: Ubisoft could fall into dependence on Tencent, but is trying to avoid it on the sale of a large part of shares, but they have not yet led to anything, as the terms of the deal do not suit the French.
Here's What We Know
Since 2021 Ubisoft has lost 85% of its market value - in January 2021 it was $12.17 billion and was the leader among European game companies, and at the moment this figure corresponds to $1.78 billion. Only in the last year this figure has decreased by 43%.
Graph of Ubisoft market capitalisation as of 01.01.25. Source: CompaniesMarketCap.com
According to the latest financial report, Ubisoft's net debt (non-IFRS) is €1.1bn, while IFRS reported debt rose to €1.4bn, up sharply from €880.8m a year earlier.
Ubisoft's credit rating has fallen to CCC-level, which indicates imminent bankruptcy unless immediate and positive changes are made.
Ubisoft stock price chart Source: Yahoo! Finance
Reputable analyst Joost van Dreunen, founder of SuperData, has stated that Ubisoft is on the verge of bankruptcy and the publisher could be absorbed by a third-party buyer as early as 2025.
Ubisoft's valuable assets - especially Rainbow Six Siege and the Assassin's Creed series - may be worth more individually than together. The upcoming Assassin's Creed: Shadows will face stiff competition from PlayStation's Ghost of Yotei (a game in the same setting and genre), and recent setbacks point to deeper organisational problems beyond the individual games.
Ubisoft's last salvation may just be the successful release of Assassin's Creed: Shadows. But the once popular series has long compromised itself because of the constant self-repeating and lack of fresh ideas, so it has fewer and fewer fans, and not yet released Shadows has already become the cause of several scandals.
Let's remind, Ubisoft has released several failed games in a row, which were Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, Star Wars Outlaws, XDefiant (will close in February) and Skull Bones, and this is not counting smaller, but still costly projects, which can be attributed to the closed shooter Hyper Scape, BattleCore Arena, cancelled mobile game The Division: Heartland and delayed development of the remake of Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time.
Source: That Park Place
