Brian Ward, the CEO of the Saudi-Arabian-state-owned Savvy Video games Group, has left his function. Throughout his tenure, he oversaw $38bn of funding into numerous gaming corporations, together with Pokemon Go developer Niantic, and Monopoly Go’s Scopely.
In a message despatched to workers, verified by Bloomberg, Ward wrote: “As Savvy embarks on its subsequent interval of transformational progress, that is the precise time for brand spanking new management for that evolution”. His function can be crammed briefly by Turqi Alnowaiser, deputy governor of the Public Funding Fund and Head of its Worldwide Investments Division.
Ward’s run as head of Savvy Video games Group had its wins and misses. The corporate spent $3.5bn on Niantic back in 2025 after the thunderous success of Pokémon Go, and earlier nonetheless dropped $4.9bn on Scopely, a studio greatest recognized for cell powerhouse Monopoly Go. Savvy Video games Group additionally invested closely in esports, a sector that has but to return a lot revenue and has acted extra as a advertising enterprise for the Saudi Arabian state via the esports world cup. Thoughts you, current turbulence within the center east resulted within the newest occasion to maneuver out of Riyadh and into Paris.
This departure comes shortly after Saudi Arabia’s leveraged buyout of EA for an eye-watering $55bn, its largest funding within the gaming trade but and the most important acquisition of its sort in historical past. Based on sources chatting with Bloomberg, the Digital Arts acquisition has sparked concern internally at Savvy over how the 2 large Saudi-owned video-game companies can be run.
Chatting with Eurogamer, writer of Energy Play and author of the video games trade memo George Osborn, stated: “Objectively talking, he’s achieved a superb job in a tricky transient. No matter your view on the politics of the entire thing — see Energy Play for my opinion — Ward appears to have achieved the job diligently.
“In comparison with the Saudi funding in different industries, Savvy struck a smart stability between some good worth producing acquisitions and ecosystem constructing. The acquisition of Scopely was a key success, whereas pulling the plug on funding into Embracer on the proper second confirmed self-discipline. Ward in the end constructed Savvy into a formidable portfolio on behalf of the Saudi state. Whether or not it stays intact after that is one other query.”
As for what’s going to occur to Savvy Video games Group shifting ahead, Osborn factors to its unusual place in comparison with different Saudi Arabian ventures into the gaming sphere.
“It lacks the reputational clout of EA within the world video games market and lacks the financial punch of the Public Funding Fund, which has allowed one in all its deputy governors to supervise the corporate,” Osborn stated. “It additionally sits on the centre of a expensive technique at a time when the state is tightening its belt.
“Personally, I wouldn’t be stunned if its focus is directed fully in direction of the Saudi sector, if it was tucked beneath EA or if the PIF gathered it again underneath itself as a part of Imaginative and prescient 2030. No matter occurs, Savvy constructed a lot of the Saudi sector as we now see it. And Ward performed a serious function in making that occur.”