Unity Acquires Weta Digital For $1.6 Billion

If you've never heard of Weta Digital, then you've definitely heard of some of the iconic characters, movies, and shows that it's worked on.

Weta's storied portfolio includes Gollum from 'Lord of the Rings', Caesar from the 'Planet of the Apes' reboot, and the 'Game of Thrones' dragons. And now, Weta's tech belongs to Unity (NYSE: U).

Unity is flying high

An awesome acquisition wasn't all the good news yesterday either. Unity's Q3 revenue was up 43% year-over-year, exceeding expectations, and allowing the company to raise full-year guidance to between $1.08 and $1.085 billion. 

But you can find all of that on Unity's Investor Relations page, we want to get back to the dragons. 

Unity announced its $1.6 billion acquisition of visual effects juggernaut Weta Digital at its earnings call last night to much furor, and for good reason. Weta made a name for itself by bringing Tolkien's Middle Earth to life in the 'Lord of the Rings' trilogy back in the early 2000s and has gone on to work with pretty much every major film and CGI-requiring T.V. franchise you can think of -- hence, the 'GOT' dragons. 

Once the acquisition is complete, Unity then intends to make Weta's tools available to millions of creators and artists around the world via its cloud-based platform. In all likelihood, especially with Unity's loyal base of customers, Weta's market-leading digital technology will become integrated with Unity's existing suite of tools. This will make Unity a one-stop-shop for the development of a number of emerging digital products, most notably among them the infamous 'metaverse' concept.

It might fly a tad under the radar in an already packed year of acquisitions, but this could be one of the most exciting developments in new-age digital effects technology. And, with Unity at the forefront, it stands to gain the most. Watch this space. 

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