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NorthEdge Capital acquires Curve, Kuju and Testronic for $113 million

Roll-up rolled up

Date Type Companies involved Size
October 14th, 2019 acquisition Curve Digital
Kuju Entertainment
Testronic
The Catalis Group
$113m
NorthEdge Capital acquires Curve, Kuju and Testronic for $113 million

The parent company of indie publisher Curve Digital, Catalis, has been bought by UK VC firm NorthEdge Capital.

Catalis has been acquired for £90m ($113m), £46.6m of which came from NorthEdge, with the remaining sum coming from Catalis CEO Dominic Wheatley (pictured) and Vespa Capital.

Catalis Group is comprised of indie label Curve, games developer Kuju and QA firm Testronic. This deal will see the testing arm opening a New Orleans outfit. 

Catalis is under the control of a brand new venture called Project Sword Bidco, a new entity that's indirectly controlled by NorthEdge Capital.

Catalis has a number of game releases planned for the coming months including the official Narcos game, Narcos: Rise of the Cartels, A Knight’s Quest and Peaky Blinders, based on the hit TV series.

Better together

“This is an important move for us. Bringing NorthEdge in to help us grow and continuing to enjoy the support of Vespa Capital is a strong endorsement from two private equity houses," commented Wheatley. 

"Our ambition is to build the next major UK-owned games business to rival those based in other parts of the world. We have the right team and financial backing to take Catalis to the next level."

NorthEdge was previously involved in the MBO of Sheffield's Sumo Digital from US firm Foundation9 back in 2014, going on to exit the deal in 2016 ahead of the studio's IPO. 


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PCGamesInsider Contributing Editor

Alex Calvin is a freelance journalist who writes about the business of games. He started out at UK trade paper MCV in 2013 and left as deputy editor over three years later. In June 2017, he joined Steel Media as the editor for new site PCGamesInsider.biz. In October 2019 he left this full-time position at the company but still contributes to the site on a daily basis. He has also written for GamesIndustry.biz, VGC, Games London, The Observer/Guardian and Esquire UK.