VIACOM TO ACQUIRE XFIRE, INC. FOR $102 MILLION
We are very pleased to announce that Xfire has entered into an agreement to become a wholly-owned subsidiary of MTV Networks.
What does the acquisition mean to you? It means that Xfire is now backed by one of the world's leading creators of programming and content across all media. It means that Xfire will continue to grow and enhance your gaming experience. Xfire was created by gamers, for gamers. We will always remain committed to improving gaming with your friends. MTV Networks shares this vision with us, and they will help us to continue building Xfire into a larger and more exciting community, one passionate gamer at a time.
--- The Xfire Team
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OK, that's the official message. I?d like to share a few additional thoughts with you.
We started Xfire about 2 1/2 years ago, based on the desire to play games with friends and the idea that we could detect some game and network information using cool programming tricks. We convinced the founders of Ultimate Arena to let us build Xfire, and since then we've built a fantastic team full of many people who have all contributed to our success.
We never had money or desire to advertise Xfire. We figured that if we build a good enough program then everyone would want to share it with their friends. Four million registrations later, I think we've been proven correct.
Xfire is unique in many ways, but one in particular is how we dedicate our work to you--our users. We spend an enormous amount of time fixing every bug that we can find, whether it's a capitalization problem or something that only occurs on one or two machines out there. We also incorporate your suggestions every single release. I like to think that we're one of the most responsive development teams in the world. Hopefully you agree.
Our frequent releases are also pretty amazing. We've done a new release every 2 or 3 weeks since the very first release of Xfire. That has added up to countless late nights full of plenty of kooky bets, made-up games in the hallways, and other insanity. It's also been a great opportunity to tell you what we're working on through our release notes, and to hopefully show you what we're made of. Even though we're being acquired by MTV Networks, that's not going to change. We're the same people we have always been, building Xfire in the same way we always have.
Obviously, we're all very excited about being acquired by MTV Networks. It validates the success that we've already had. It also validates the methods by which we've had that success--building a great product, listening to our users, and continually improving the product based on feedback. They are very impressed by what we've accomplished so far, and they want us to continue to build our wonderful community.
So... after all that we've been through, I think we've proven that Xfire cannot be stopped. Thanks so much for your support so far, and please continue to let us know what you want and expect out of us. We will deliver.
Game on!
--- Chris Kirmse
VP Engineering, Xfire
PS We'll be a little extra active on the forums today to help answer your questions as much as we can
