A gaggle of lawmakers in america have urged the Federal Commerce Fee (FTC) to overview the proposed acquisition of EA by Saudi sovereign wealth fund PIF and different traders.
Labor Caucus co-chairs Reps. Steven Horsford, Debbie Dingell, Mark Pocan, and Donald Norcross led over 40 Home Democrats in signing a letter calling on FTC chair Andrew Ferguson to scrutinize the take-private deal over considerations it may warp the stability of energy inside the online game business.
Labor Caucus is comprised of over 120 members of congress centered on “advancing the wants of working folks and the labor motion in Congress.”
The letter was despatched on January 22 and suggests the debt-financed $55 billion acquisition, which can purportedly end in PIF holding a 93.4 p.c stake within the Battlefield and Apex Legends writer, will incentive layoffs, offshoring, studio closures, and different cost-cutting measures.
It notes that EA is at present one of many largest employers in america’ online game business, and post-acquisition would have the ability to broaden its market dominance to the detriment of staff.
“The FTC’s 2023 Merger Tips clarify that mergers harming staff, suppressing wages, or enabling dominant companies to cut back labor demand might violate antitrust legal guidelines. Given the dimensions of this acquisition and EA’s present dominance over the home video-game labor market, we imagine cautious scrutiny of this deal is crucial,” reads the letter.
“The transaction additionally raises critical considerations about interlocking directorates and customary possession throughout competing recreation publishers. This sort of overlap heightens the danger of coordinated anti-labor practices, together with wage suppression, hiring restrictions, or casual no-poach dynamics and will additional weaken the already restricted bargaining energy staff have on this business. These dangers ought to weigh closely because the Fee evaluates whether or not the acquisition would go away staff extra susceptible to coordinated or unilateral harms.”
Might EA be used to pursue the “geopolitical goals” of its new house owners?
EA has made important layoffs in recent times, however lately advised the proposed buyout will not end in “speedy” job cuts. The corporate additionally claimed it can retain inventive management beneath its potential new house owners.
Regardless of these assertions, calls to scrutinze the deal have beforehand been echoed by U.S. labor union Communications Staff of America. Two U.S. senators, Richard Blumenthal and Elizabeth Warren, have additionally raised considerations of their very own.
PIF—which is owned by the Saudi state and chaired by crown prince Mohammed bin Salman—has made quite a lot of main investments throughout the sport business.
Final yr, the wealth fund acquired Pokemon Go maker Niantic (although its Savvy Video games subsidiary) and has beforehand sunk money into Nintendo, Take-Two Interactive, Embracer Group, and extra.
The group has been widely-criticized as a automobile for culture-washing, with Human Rights Watch reporting that PIF has straight “facilitated and benefited from human rights abuses.”
Based on human rights advocacy group, Amnesty Worldwide, these abuses embody a crackdown on free speech, discrimination in opposition to ladies and members of the LGBTQ group, the abuse of migrant staff, and extra.
PIF chairman Mohammed bin Salman, the de-facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, was additionally linked to the 2018 homicide of Washington Put up journalist, Jamal Khashoggi.
As famous by the BBC, bin Salman was nonetheless going through questions over his connection to the killing as lately as November 2025, when he was quizzed by journalists throughout a gathering with US president Donald Trump on the White Home.
Final yr, skilled analysts spoke to Sport Developer in regards to the seismic deal and warned it may end in nearer oversight from house owners “pursuing geopolitical goals.”
