The maker of a popular app is about to acquire another. More specifically, TikTok owner ByteDance is about to acquire Moonton Technology, the maker of Mobile Legends: Bang Bang.
Reuters reports that, on the ByteDance side of things, the acquisition would be done by Nuverse, its video games division. The report also cites an internal memo where Montoon CEO Yuan Jing said that the company will maintain its autonomy.
ByteDance was not the only company eyeing Moonton for acquisition though. China’s gaming giant Tencent previously made a bid for Moonton, but its offer was matched by ByteDance. What makes things even more interesting is the fact that Moonton was founded by a former Tencent employee. The Reuters report also makes mention of Tencent, alongside Riot Games, having tried taking legal action against Moonton for copyright infringement back in 2017.
Bytedance, the owner of TikTok, has acquired Moonton, the developers of Mobile Legends.
This is one of the biggest acquisitions of the year and shows how Bytedance is serious about entering the core gaming space
Mobile Legends is one of the most popular smartphone MOBA games pic.twitter.com/9GcqLCB9Fj
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) March 22, 2021
But with ByteDance being the one to make the acquisition, this gives it a mobile MOBA title. And this puts it in direct competition with Tencent, and its own Honor of Kings, known outside of China as Arena of Valor.
Though for all intents and purposes, this acquisition should not change much for users of their app. At least, not in the short term. But the acquisition may see ByteDance churn out more mobile games using what it learns from Moonton and Mobile Legends.
(Source: reuters)
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