Technical services provider Keywords Studios has acquired Santa Clara-based work-for-hire studio Sperasoft in a deal worth $27 million.

The deal is made up of $21 million in cash upfront, with an additional $1 million on the first anniversary of the acquisition. The rest will be paid in 260,049 new ordinary shares, which will again be distributed next year.

Sperasoft has worked on a number of high-profile mobile games, including EA's Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes and Minions Paradise, as well as Warner Brothers' Injustice: Gods Among Us and WWE Immortals. It currently has 400 staff, with offices in St Petersburg, Krakow, and Volgograd.

Entry point into co-development

"The acquisition of Sperasoft provides us with an entry point into co-development, positioning us as a strategic partner to games developers at the early stages of the games development lifecycle," said Keywords CEO Andrew Day.

"As games are becoming bigger and are higher definition, game developers are increasingly relying upon co-development arrangements with companies like Sperasoft to provide them with broader capability to develop both initial games and additional content and features post launch."

Keywords is known for its relentless acquisition strategy, but has recently started increasing the amounts it is willing to spend. Its most recent acquisition was QA and customer support provider VMC for $66.4 million.