Electronic Arts has completed its acquisition by a consortium of Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF), Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners, ending the publisher's decades-long tenure as a publicly traded company and making it one of the largest take-private deals the games industry has seen.

The consortium, anchored by PIF with private equity firm Silver Lake and Jared Kushner's Affinity Partners, agreed in late September 2025 to acquire EA at $210 per share in cash, valuing the company at approximately $55 billion. With the transaction now closed, EA shares cease trading and the publisher operates under private ownership.

The deal ranks as the largest all-cash sponsor take-private on record, and it removes one of the industry's three largest Western publishers from public markets. For EA's development studios — which span EA SPORTS franchises including FC and Madden, plus Battlefield, The Sims, and Apex Legends — the immediate operational question is how capital allocation changes without quarterly earnings pressure.

What changes for EA's studios and partners?

Private ownership typically shifts a publisher's incentives from Wall Street guidance toward long-term holdco returns. For teams inside EA, that could mean fewer public-facing financial milestones — such as live-service bookings disclosures and net booking guidance — and, in time, different expectations on release timing and monetization cadence for titles built on EA's proprietary tech, including the Frostbite engine.

For licensed partners, including football bodies tied to EA SPORTS FC and third-party platform holders, counterparty risk now sits with a private consortium rather than public shareholders. PIF's involvement also ties EA more directly into Saudi Arabia's broader gaming investment program, which has already taken stakes in Nintendo, Savvy Games Group acquisitions, and esports ventures.

How was the deal financed?

PIF, already a significant EA shareholder before the buyout, rolled its existing stake into the transaction alongside roughly $36 billion in equity contributions from the consortium, with JPMorgan committing approximately $20 billion in debt financing — an unusually large leveraged component for a deal of this type. That debt load will shape the new owners' priorities around cash-generative franchises and live-service operations.

What happens to EA's listing?

With completion announced, EA stock is delisted from NASDAQ. Andrew Wilson remains chief executive officer, and the company has said its headquarters and core leadership structure stay in place through the transition.

What to watch next

The signal worth tracking now is EA's first post-close capital decision — whether the private owners maintain the existing slate of announced projects and studio investments, or begin restructuring to service the deal's debt. Watch also for leadership commentary on the next earnings-cycle equivalent, as private EA will no longer report quarterly results publicly.

The completed buyout also sets a reference price for other large publishers: if EA's $55 billion valuation holds as a private asset, expect renewed investor attention on consolidation possibilities across the remaining public publishers.