UPDATE (December 22nd): GAME has told Esports News UK that Multiplay Ltd previously consisted of two parts of the business: Digital and Esports & Events. Unity Technologies APS has purchased Multiplay Digital, while the Esports & Events part of Multiplay will remain within GAME Digital plc (later renamed to Player1 Events).
Original article (November 28th):
The Multiplay Esports brand will no longer be associated with the UK’s Insomnia gaming festivals.
Multiplay parent company GAME has sold Multiplay’s hosting division to US-based game developer engine provider Unity Technologies.
Unity has acquired Multiplay Ltd and its game hosting business from GAME Digital for £19 million. However, the events business and its associated IPs (i.e. Insomnia) will remain with GAME.
This means Multiplay is no longer associated with Insomnia. GAME has already dropped the Multiplay and Multiplay Esports branding from its websites and social media accounts. For example, the Multiplay Esports Twitter page has been renamed to Insomnia Esports. The Multiplay Esports Twitch channel is currently a dead link.
“Multiplay is thrilled to be joining Unity for what will be an exciting new chapter.”
Paul Manuel, Multiplay
Multiplay serves games including Titanfall 2, Rocket League and Rust. It will continue to operate under the Multiplay brand and the Multiplay game hosting team will join Unity while continuing to operate from Blackfield in the UK.
“The team at Multiplay have created scalable multiplayer technology that gives all game creators, from indies to AAA studios, the ability to create performant experiences that can serve hundreds of thousands of players at once,” said John Riccitiello, CEO of Unity Technologies (and former EA boss).
“We welcome the Multiplay team to the Unity family.”
Multiplay MD Paul Manuel added: “Multiplay is thrilled to be joining Unity for what will be an exciting new chapter.
“It’s a great fit because like Unity, it’s in our core to solve hard problems so game developers don’t have to. This deal will let us bring scalable AAA quality server technology and infrastructure to a much wider audience.”
Multiplay was founded by Craig “Wizzo” Fletcher in 1997, who built Insomnia from the ground up and saw it move to the Birmingham NEC a few years back.
Not bad for a business that started in 2002 with a single server in London running Call of Duty and Medal of Honor servers! Congrats to the team and best of luck for the future! https://t.co/AKunesSOIP
— Craig Fletcher (@wizzouk) November 28, 2017
He is currently employed by GAME as SVP of esports and competitive gaming strategy.
The news comes after GAME announced it was looking to sell the Multiplay digital arm earlier this year.
GAME posted a dip in full-year profit earlier this month.
According to GAME’s full-year report, Multiplay’s Digital sales more than doubled from £2.1 million to £4.5 million, whilst Multiplay’s Events and Esports sales increased almost 50%, from £4.8 million to £7.3 million.
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
