- Games Workshop and Amazon made an ‘settlement in precept’ final 12 months
- Peel Hunt analysts: Amazon deal is a ‘recreation changer’ for Games Workshop
- Games Workshop additionally advised traders it had not modified its annual forecasts
Games Workshop has struck a cope with Amazon to develop Warhammer 40,000 into movies and tv collection.
In a deal being described by analysts as a ‘recreation changer’ for Games Workshop, the tabletop recreation producer mentioned it will work with the tech behemoth for 12 months to ‘agree artistic pointers’ for potential productions.
Amazon has additionally gained merchandising rights and a license to possibility the equal rights within the Warhammer Fantasy universe when the preliminary Warhammer 40,000 manufacturing is launched.
Agreement: Miniature wargames producer Games Workshop has struck a cope with Amazon to develop Warhammer 40,000 into movies and tv collection
Games Workshop’s cope with Amazon comes a 12 months after the pair first introduced an ‘settlement in precept’ to make movie and tv content material.
Former Superman actor Henry Cavill has been linked to star and govt produce a possible Warhammer 40,000 adaptation.
Launched in 1987, Warhammer 40,000 is ready within the distant future, the place people, aliens, and supernatural monsters struggle one another in a state of complete warfare.
Peel Hunt analysts Charles Hall and Andrew Ford mentioned the Amazon deal was a ‘recreation changer’ for Games Workshop, because it brings Warhammer to the display screen for the primary time.
They added: ‘Amazon has expertise of this style, with the Lord of the Rings collection having over 100m viewers. A 40k collection would offer the chance to carry Warhammer to a wider international viewers.’
Games Workshop moreover advised traders it had not modified its forecasts for the monetary 12 months ending early June 2024.
For the six months to 26 November, the Nottingham-based firm anticipates a core working revenue of at the very least £82million, in comparison with £70.7million in the identical interval final 12 months.
Meanwhile, it expects core turnover of at the very least £235million, up from £212.3million, because of stable buying and selling since September.
As a consequence, earlier this month, Games Workshop declared that employees would every obtain a £2,500 bonus below its revenue sharing scheme.
Games Workshop was initially based in 1975 by three faculty mates as a maker of hand-crafted wood boardgames, later turning into the European distributor for Dungeons & Dragons.
The firm loved the second-best return on funding of any FTSE 250 inventory over the past decade, with a 2,630 per cent enhance in shareholder worth.
It partly achieved this via repairing relationships with followers alienated by its combative strategy to copyright points and launching or reintroducing extra simplified video games, akin to American football-inspired Blood Bowl.
Covid-19 additional boosted the group’s commerce as homebound shoppers sought to occupy their time with boardgames while spending extra time indoors.
‘Games Workshop is aware of it’s sitting on a gold mine with its fantasy world IP,’ mentioned Russ Mould, funding director at AJ Bell,
He added: ‘It’s made a mint from promoting miniature figures that hobbyists like to color and deploy in tabletop battles, and there is a chance to make much more cash creating dramas round its huge array of characters and universes, in addition to promoting related merchandise.’
Games Workshop Group shares had been 1.5 per cent up at £99.35 on Monday morning.