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DDM: Game Investments and M&A Totaled $17.5 Billion Across 985 Deals in 2024

DDM reported $17.5 billion in game-industry investments and M&A across 985 transactions in 2024, with year-over-year growth measured against an adjusted 2023 baseline.
From TheFinanceBase Team2 min to read
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Digital Development Management (DDM) reported that game-industry investments and mergers and acquisitions totaled $17.5 billion across 985 transactions in 2024. Its comparison with 2023 excludes Microsoft’s $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard, an unusually large deal that would otherwise overwhelm the year-over-year picture.

What DDM counted in the 2024 total

DDM’s $17.5 billion figure combines two distinct categories: investments and M&A. The 985 transactions consisted of 812 investments and 173 M&A transactions, according to the company’s 2024 report.

2024 category Value Transactions
Investments $7.7 billion 812
M&A $9.9 billion 173
Combined investments and M&A $17.5 billion 985

Figures are DDM’s published totals for 2024. The component values add to $17.6 billion rather than $17.5 billion because the published figures are rounded.

Why the comparison with 2023 is adjusted

DDM reported $12.6 billion across 848 combined investments and M&As in 2023 after excluding Microsoft’s $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard. On that adjusted basis, the 2024 combined total was up 39% in value and 16% in transaction volume. DDM’s published 2023 total before that adjustment was $76.8 billion across 849 transactions, a result dominated by the Activision Blizzard deal.

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The adjusted comparison makes the change in activity easier to interpret, but it is not a like-for-like comparison with the unadjusted 2023 headline. The two-year comparison depends on DDM’s decision to treat that acquisition as an outlier.

Investments and M&A each grew on DDM’s adjusted basis

Investments

DDM counted $7.7 billion across 812 investments in 2024, compared with $4.6 billion across 691 investments in 2023. That is a 68% increase in investment value and an 18% increase in count. The dollar total remained 81% below DDM’s 2021 investment figure of $41.4 billion, while the 2024 count was approaching the 2022 high of 1,001 investments.

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Mergers and acquisitions

DDM reported $9.9 billion across 173 M&A transactions in 2024. Its unadjusted 2023 figure was $76.8 billion across 158 transactions; excluding the Activision Blizzard acquisition, DDM put 2023 M&A at $8.1 billion across 157 transactions. Against that adjusted baseline, 2024 M&A value rose 22% and transaction volume rose 10%.

Q4’s high total was concentrated in a few large acquisitions

Q4 2024 was the year’s largest quarter by combined value, with $6.0 billion across 236 investments and M&As. That total consisted of $906.2 million across 201 investments and $5.0 billion across 35 M&A transactions.

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Two acquisitions accounted for most of Q4’s reported M&A value: EQT Group and others’ $2.7 billion acquisition of Keywords Studios, and Playtika’s $2.0 billion acquisition of Superplay. The quarterly pattern shows why a large aggregate does not necessarily mean deal value was evenly distributed across transactions or throughout the year.

Fund announcements are a separate measure

DDM also reported $58.9 billion in new capital announced across 132 funds in 2024. This is a separate measure from completed or announced investment and M&A transaction value, and should not be added to the $17.5 billion combined total.

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How to read the figures—and their limits

DDM says its approach can make quarterly totals differ substantially from those of other firms because it excludes announced deals from its quarterly tally. The company’s stated rationale is that this better reflects money deployed in each quarter and provides consistency for companies assessing investment and acquisition activity. That is DDM’s methodological position, not evidence of an industry-wide standard.

The report’s public article does not provide a full transaction-level dataset or detailed definitions for every category, so the headline figures cannot establish deal returns, deal quality, or the causes of activity across the industry. DDM’s published figures describe aggregate activity; they do not show how value was distributed across individual companies or sectors.

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Source: Digital Development Management, “2024 Ends as a Strong Year with $17.5B Across 985 Investments/M&As,” published February 21, 2025.

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