The Saudi Public Investment Fund raised its stake in the Japanese company Toei Films and Animation to 6.03%, a report showed today, Friday, reflecting the increasing exposure of the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund to the Japanese media sector.
The ownership report submitted to the Japanese regulators indicated that the share of the Public Investment Fund in Toei Corporation, which is based in Tokyo, rose from 5.00% to 6.03%.
These are PIF’s investments in the electronic games sector
Last month, the Public Investment Fund revealed that it had increased its stake in the giant of electronic sports games, “Nintendo”, to 8.26%. The leading sovereign fund has also invested in Japanese game companies Nexon, Capcom and Koei Tecmo.
The fund recently acquired a stake worth $265 million in the Chinese company VSPO, which has stakes in a large number of electronic game companies.
He owns more than 8% of the Swedish company Embracer.
This comes after the “Safi Games Group”, a unit of the Public Investment Fund, invested $ 265 million in the “VSPO” company, which promotes and manages competitive gaming events such as “League of Legends” and “PUBG”.
The Shanghai-based company, formerly known as VSPN, which is also backed by Sequoia China and Susquehanna International Group, did not disclose its valuation in the Series C funding round. VSPO”.
The funding could help VSPO restart professional gaming in China after a two-year lull, when pandemic restrictions and Beijing’s crackdown on the internet sector quieted the world’s largest gaming arena.
In January, the PIF made more investments in Asian technology companies, participating in Korea’s pre-IPO funding for Kakao Entertainment, an app group that publishes popular anime shows and novels online, which raised $930 million from investors.
The company, a unit of Korean social media giant Kakao, said it raised 1.2 trillion won by issuing about 2.26 million shares at 255,116 won to the Saudi Public Investment Fund and Singapore-based Pwarp Investment in one of the largest funding rounds ever. in South Korea.
Kakao Entertainment will use the capital to expand its content. The company produced a slate of shows for Netflix Inc, capitalizing on the growing interest in Korean content from “K-pop” to movies since the advent of “Squid Game.”
