Initial Public Offering. That means you may be able to buy paradox stock soon.....
- 4
- 1
Paradox, Never Sell Out
- Thread starter General Karthos
- Start date
-
We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
Initial Public Offering. That means you may be able to buy paradox stock soon.....
Paradox is in a very interesting place as a company (and investors think so to apperently). It's a rapidly growing company that is willing to take big risks, and so far those risks have had higher payout then they have failures, though Pdox publishing has some serious lemons with their name attached, were it not for the culture that put their name on those lemons, they'd not have had the successes like Magicka either, and one Magicka is worth a dozen... let's not name names. That's just the nature of indie development and supporting indie development. But Pdox has certainly been moving onwards, having increasingly invested itself in a reltionship with Obsidian the expand out its market, and I'd not be shocked if that relationship grows ever closer until Obsidian is, essentially, the RPG arm of grander paradox, provided Obsidian doesn't get poached (Unlikely, as the current leadership of Obsidian is pretty down on major publishers for burning them too often, but there's only so much money you can say no to).
Paradox itself is doing far too well to be bought out by another major studio, except in a hypothetical buy out and kill the competition reason.
The danger does lie in where Paradox going public takes it. As Paradox grows as a company and more people buy into it, risks will become less and less acceptable, business being inherently risk averse, and the danger lies in them getting stuck in a mentality of "We only do what we do and only that". That said, that would not effect the products that Pdox the dev studio produces, since they make grand strategy and do it damn well and that's sort of the core of Pdox does, so in a rut situation, well that's what they'd be producing.
Paradox itself is doing far too well to be bought out by another major studio, except in a hypothetical buy out and kill the competition reason.
The danger does lie in where Paradox going public takes it. As Paradox grows as a company and more people buy into it, risks will become less and less acceptable, business being inherently risk averse, and the danger lies in them getting stuck in a mentality of "We only do what we do and only that". That said, that would not effect the products that Pdox the dev studio produces, since they make grand strategy and do it damn well and that's sort of the core of Pdox does, so in a rut situation, well that's what they'd be producing.
- 11
- 1
Going Public does open them up to potential hostile take-overs.
The question will be how much of the stock they'll keep for themselves, as long as Paradox retains a healthy majority of the stock they can stay independent, but if they lose that, they'll be getting bought rather quickly, as most investors are only interested in short-term gains, rather than long-term prosperity of the company they have stock in.
The question will be how much of the stock they'll keep for themselves, as long as Paradox retains a healthy majority of the stock they can stay independent, but if they lose that, they'll be getting bought rather quickly, as most investors are only interested in short-term gains, rather than long-term prosperity of the company they have stock in.
- 2
I love Paradox, but if they're bought out be EA or the like, I'm out.
If they can manage to hollow out Bioware from the inside and make them produce huge piles of avian droppings like Mass Effect 3 and Dragon Age: Inquisition, they can ruin any company.
- 13
- 1
Successfull companies going public is a natural thing. You all sure wouldn't want to miss the chance to become a multi-millionaire over night if you own a fair bit of the business.
They explicitly said they want to give their employee and fans a first buy opportunity, and I would be gladly investing. I don't see Paradox failing anytime soon. I'm sure we will get further information about that at some point.
Of course there is always the risk of being taken over if one issues too much stock, but you can easily prevent that with the right distribution.
Not every business turns from peaceful traders to ruthless capitalists just because they go public
Additionally, even EA doesn't destroy studios for fun, they want their investment back. The few million profit that Paradox might have don't even make them move from their chair, so to speak.
Data for 2015: Paradox revenue 604 million SEK (66 million euro), EA 3575 million USD (3185 million euro).
They explicitly said they want to give their employee and fans a first buy opportunity, and I would be gladly investing. I don't see Paradox failing anytime soon. I'm sure we will get further information about that at some point.
Of course there is always the risk of being taken over if one issues too much stock, but you can easily prevent that with the right distribution.
Not every business turns from peaceful traders to ruthless capitalists just because they go public
Additionally, even EA doesn't destroy studios for fun, they want their investment back. The few million profit that Paradox might have don't even make them move from their chair, so to speak.
Data for 2015: Paradox revenue 604 million SEK (66 million euro), EA 3575 million USD (3185 million euro).
Last edited:
- 4
No, Paradox, please don't sell too much of your company at first! You know what it leads to; first it's just people making money and getting rich and fans getting rich from investments too, but then soon you're just going to be doing whatever your shareholders want and cutting corners and making mobile games and games for the lowest common denominator!
I suppose if they sell very little shares at first it'd be okay but I don't like this one bit, the going public.
I suppose if they sell very little shares at first it'd be okay but I don't like this one bit, the going public.
- 1
if they do a IPO then those shareholders wouldn't be demanding much as the company is already in profit and most people wont interfere with a company that's creating profit, in addition a lot of large companies have sstems in place to prevent a shareholders wielding too much power, a good example of this is in the UK where shareholders refused to accept a bonus package to be given to bp excec although the vote happened the company can just ignore it.
overall just because of an ipo doesn't mean its the end of the world
overall just because of an ipo doesn't mean its the end of the world
- 1
- 1
Nah, it depends of who buys the stocks. If it is a publisher like EA, then the company would be placed in terminal decline in terms of quality and inventiveness.
- 1
Mobile Games are the Work of the devil.
But I could see Paradox somehow making Stragety games working on Console.
- 5
- 4
I really don't care as long as they don't make them cross platform.
Cross platform = The PC become a port of the console version with every UI and design elements (limiting gameplay options) still the same as said console version. This turns strategy games into oversimplified "plant vs zombies" level crap.
I gave up on the future of RPG games due to that crap until Pillars of Eternity came out.
- 7
I meant do the PC version first then do a Console port at a later date, you know for those whose PCs might not manage it...
Plus it would be useful to show friends who don't game on the PC the greatness of Paradox
And what is this Plants Versus Zombies you speak off? Is it some Cash cow franchise?
Later, the releases will become concurrent, and after that the console version becomes the prime version and the controls are not designed to work primarily with a mouse and keyboard.
- 1
Correction: only if Paradox retains 50+1% of their stock is that not an issue - and even then they can be sued if they put anything ahead of moar profits.
Once you go onto the stock market, your company is not your own.
That said, if Paradox does sell out, their best employees will just leave and form another indie studio and take the Paradox reputation with them. It's what happened to Black Isle and it's happening to Bioware now.
- 3
- 1
I'm afraid of something. Before CK2 most of Paradox's games had some issues and bugs at release. But Paradox was not so big and the community waited until they release patch or expansion that solve everything (EUIII vanilla is a good exemple of the era where the first tip for a new paradoxian was "wait some patch before buy a Paradox game" ^^).
Now Paradox is a bigger company with more players and the expectations are higher ; internet changed a lot and now everything is just drama and bandwagon where players don't want to wait improvements for a game: have bugs or some issues when you release a game and your game/company's reputation is going to be destroyed. The first month is so important for your game's future.
10 years ago EUIII would have never existed Now all releases (HOI, Stellaris) are dangerous for Para. And i don't want a crash because of a stupid internet shitstorm.
Now Paradox is a bigger company with more players and the expectations are higher ; internet changed a lot and now everything is just drama and bandwagon where players don't want to wait improvements for a game: have bugs or some issues when you release a game and your game/company's reputation is going to be destroyed. The first month is so important for your game's future.
10 years ago EUIII would have never existed
Now all releases (HOI, Stellaris) are dangerous for Para. And i don't want a crash because of a stupid internet shitstorm.- 3
I'm afraid of something. Before CK2 most of Paradox's games had some issues and bugs at release. But Paradox was not so big and the community waited until they release patch or expansion that solve everything (EUIII vanilla is a good exemple of the era where the first tip for a new paradoxian was "wait some patch before buy a Paradox game" ^^).
Now Paradox is a bigger company with more players and the expectations are higher ; internet changed a lot and now everything is just drama and bandwagon where players don't want to wait improvements for a game: have bugs or some issues when you release a game and your game/company's reputation is going to be destroyed. The first month is so important for your game's future.
10 years ago EUIII would have never existed
EU4 and CK2 both had some pretty major bugs at release and with every update, yet they are enormous commercial successes. A lot of new players (including myself) joined when these games were released and have stuck around since. EU4 is still often visible as one of the most played games on steam.
I don't think you have to worry so much about bugs, the only concern I have is an EA or EA-like company buying out Paradox and destroying the spirit of the games.
- 1
They are going to a variety of different studios, so it isn't really a great example. But there are numerous other examples where a 'core' team made a new start up (Interplay devs formed Obsidian, Westwood devs went to Petroglyph, etc). As far as I know Drew Karipshian (one of the authors for ME) left and returned, several devs are in the process of Kickstartering a new RPG IP, and others have gone to a dozen different companies (sadly). I wish they'd all organize and get together and form a new company, but it looks like for the moment we are doomed
- 1
EUIII 1.0 was buggy as hell (first game to use Clausewitz ^^), CKII 1.0 and EUIV 1.0 were perfect if you want to compare with previous Para's games.
But you're right "EA syndrom" is more dangerous.
- 3