Genius at Bank
Codemasters clutch onto themselves as they seek help from the city
According to The Sunday Times, David and Richard Darling, owners of Codemasters and valued at £400m between them, are in talks to sell part of their company because they can't afford to fund the costly stream of expansion. Codemasters is the biggest developer/publisher operating in the UK, formed by the two Darlings and their father. Although the company had demonstrated record profits growth for the UK gaming sector, it is now struggling and is expected to make a loss this year. Despite chart-topping successes like Operation Flashpoint and Severance, the company is ruefully having to admit that it doesn't take much to achieve that goal in the short term. Fronting development costs for services like the Codemasters Multiplayer Network has taken a lot out of the company, as have other, more ambitious expansion plans. At the present time, the Darlings are trying to sell a £25m stake in the company to venture capitalists in the city, a move which the Times comments comes only two years after they took a dividend of almost £10m out of the business. Although the Darlings will invest another £1m in the firm, of the £25m figure Richard points out that "we don't have that sort of money". "We have made presentations to a lot of venture capitalists," he told The Sunday Times. "We are expecting the process to come to a conclusion by the end of July or start of August."