Thunderful Sells Publisher Headup For €500k After Acquiring The Studio For 11 Million

Something’s not adding up here

by Jim Norman 6h ago

Image: Nintendo LifeThunderful Group is once again back in the news today as it has been reported that the studio is selling Pumpkin Jack publisher Headup at a fraction of what it was bought for back in 2021.

Word of this sale comes to us from Gamesindustry.biz which reports that Thunderful has sold the publisher for €500,000 — quite the drop from the €11 million it spent to acquire the company just three years ago.

The studio has been (re)purchased by its founder and CEO Dieter Schoeller via Microcuts Holding. Incidentally, Schoeller is the vice president of production at Thunderful. Talk about keeping your friends close, eh?

The deal has now been completed between Headup and Thunderful, though it is still dependent on the transfer of Studio Fizbin to Thunderful (acquired via Headup last year), the rewriting of three IP-related contracts and shareholder approval before it is fully finalised.

While Headup will reclaim its back catalogue of games as well as those currently in development, the sale agreement states that Thunderful is still to receive a share of up to €300k on an as-yet-unannounced title from the studios.

All of this comes as a part of Thunderful’s restructuring program which was announced in January of this year and is set to affect 20% of its workforce.

What do you make of the latest news from Thunderful? Let us know in the comments.

[source gamesindustry.biz]

Jim came to Nintendo Life in 2022 and, despite his insistence that The Minish Cap is the best Zelda game and his unwavering love for the Star Wars prequels (yes, really), he has continued to write news and features on the site ever since.

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