Buy-Out Saves British Retailer GAME

Hevva

Shipwrecked, comatose, newsie
Aug 2, 2011
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Buy-Out Saves British Retailer GAME



A financial acquisitions firm has purchased the bankrupt British games chain and safeguarded the immediate future of its remaining stores.


The past few weeks have been finally folded [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/116397-GAME-Needs-286-Million-to-Survive-March] early last week, a collapse which resulted in the loss of 2,000 jobs and the closure of hundreds of stores. Now, for the first time in 2012, there's good news to report: The Game Group's British operation has been bought over and rescued from bankruptcy by a financial firm, safeguarding the 3,000+ jobs still attached to the company.

OpCapita, a large conglomerate which owns one of the UK's biggest electronics retailers, brokered a deal with The Game Group's creditors which transferred effective ownership of the business to a financial firm called Baker Acquisitions Ltd. This means that, for the forseeable future, The Game Group's remaining GAME and Gamestation stores are safe from closure.

However, the agreement reached between Baker and the restructuring firm overseeing The Game Group's return to solvency does not include provisions for severance- and back-pay owed to the 2,000 employees who were laid off during the company's bankruptcy.

Former employees in the Republic of Ireland were given no information about severance whatsoever, and their here [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/116548-GAME-Ireland-Employees-Denied-Redundancy-Pay]). No protests over the abscence of severance pay have been reported in the United Kingdom.

Commenting on the deal, OpCapita managing partner Henry Jackson said that, "We strongly believe there is a place on the high street for a video gaming specialist and GAME is the leading brand in a £2.8bn market in the UK."

"We have assembled a strong team of experienced industry operators to implement the programme of operational change that is needed. There is a huge amount to do but we look forward to the challenge of restoring GAME's fortunes in partnership with its employees and suppliers," concluded Jackson.

What does the future hold for GAME and Gamestation, then? No details have yet been released on any possible changes to the fundamentals of The Game Group's business model, though the deal indicates that the new owners do not intend to close any more stores in the immediate future. Regardless of how we all felt about GAME, the British games industry as a whole would likely have suffered without the presence of a large and very visible high-street retailer for its wares; the loss of jobs is lamentable, as is the continued severance-limbo faced by the company's ex-employees, but hopefully the continued survival of the chain will mean good things for the British industry.


Source: MCV UK [http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/official-game-exits-administration/093722]



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Electric Alpaca

What's on the menu?
May 2, 2011
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I knew this was to happen, and finally it's official.

Now what will be interesting to see is how relationships between publishers are handled - I would find it highly probable that those that did not abandon last minute will be given a more favourable station (i.e. increased floor space, reward points multiplier), I'm mainly looking at Microsoft and Activision, whom tried to drive the boot in.

Sony, however, made a very intelligent business decision and declared their faith in the retailer.

I see in the future their product in both Comet and Game Group alike being granted preferential treatment.

I just need to wait now for the company to be re-listed (if it is to be re-listed separate of OpCapita) and continue to make money from them.
 

Scarim Coral

Jumped the ship
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Oct 29, 2010
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Unless the new business structure is to lower their game price to match those selling online I still have no interest in them.
 

Proverbial Jon

Not evil, just mildly malevolent
Nov 10, 2009
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Hevva said:
OpCapita, a large conglomerate which owns one of the UK's biggest electronics retailers...
I wouldn't have said that Comet was really "one of the biggest" electronics retailers. Based on that description I expected to see that OpCapita owned Currys/PC World. Still, they have only just bought Comet out so I guess there's still a possible future for both them and GAME/Gamestation.
 

Karma168

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Nov 7, 2010
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Pedro The Hutt said:
And there go all chances of a resurgence of smaller independent retailers in the UK.
While i'd like to see smaller companies take over this market niche if Game collapsed you wouldn't see them make a reappearance, all you'd get is supermarkets like Tesco taking up even more of the market. The only area Game beat the supermarkets in was trade-ins and resale, both of which I could easily see supermarkets moving into when they saw the gap.
 

CardinalPiggles

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Jun 24, 2010
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Hopefully being the operative word.

I don't shop at GAME anymore, but I still at least browse GameStation when I pass it, it would be nice if it stayed open.

And it would be even better if they managed to pay back their poor employees who not only lost their jobs but lost out on money they are owed.

Captcha: gee whiz. Probably my favourite ever.
 

1337mokro

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Dec 24, 2008
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To bad, would have been more than glad to see the first obsolete rickety old price setting industry exploiting monopolizing shitty store go right out of the door.

It might still go that way and this might just be a really really stupid investment, but even in the best case scenario it'll take a few fiscal years before they pull the plug permanently.

I REALLY hope the entire collective game industry just says fuck you to GAME and pulls their stock. No matter what the investors do if no games are coming in there ain't going to be no sales (which there already are barely any off except for used).
 

Not G. Ivingname

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Nov 18, 2009
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No!

The company was a terrible one! It was like if Gamestop had even more of a monopoly!

Game was able to utterly screw the industry over constantly, screwed over it's own employees, bought out all it's competition, and was holding the U.K. game store market with an iron fist. It over saturated the market with far to many stores. It NEEDED to die.
 

WingedWalrus

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Mar 8, 2012
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So pleased by this news! If nothing else, at least more people won't lose their jobs. As much as I want to support local smaller game retailers, in my area, Game is all we've got, and I'd much rather buy in-person than off the internet.
 

-Torchedini-

Gone Bonzo
Dec 28, 2009
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While I'm happy for the people who haven't lost their jobs I can't be happy about the takeover. Because I think this is gonna be another big money sink. Just a big waste of money.

There is a reason why it neared bankruptcy, and that in combination with the rise of digital distribution I don't see any future for a company that specializes in regular videogamesales.
 

Bvenged

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Sep 4, 2009
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It's not saved until it changes its business model.
Simple solution that would get myself and many otehrs going there again: sell games for less, rework trade-in model, redesign special-offer promotions.

The games at game/gamestation are sometimes double the price of its online counterpart INCLUDING postage. They don't have to pay postage to the customer so I would have expected it to be AT LEAST £1.50 cheaper than online, per game. But it's not. It's more like 80% the price on top. If a game is £20 new with free delivery at Amazon.co.uk, at a game store it would be £21 second hand there and £27.99 new. That's why I rarely shopped there.
 

MarsProbe

Circuitboard Seahorse
Dec 13, 2008
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Good news this. I think we now have one Game (and one Gamestation) open in the city here - it's better than nothing. I just hope things get sorted out stockwise fairly soon. It's rather depressing to visit a nearly empty Game shop with only a smattering of games and accessories spread around the shelf space.
 

Dogstile

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Jan 17, 2009
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Good news. Its not like they offered games for a stupidly high price anyway. They offered it at the standard and if you really wanted a deal you'd just got to CEX instead.