[panabee]

trimming fat while investing in innovation is not mutually exclusive, esp if you have a sizable cash cushion and a new CEO like zynga. on the surface, it seems unfair to compare this acquisition with omgpop since naturalmotion offers defensible IP and technology that can be used in helping zynga's games appear more lifelike, or like lucas technologies, help others make their creations, whether games or movies, appear more lifelike. more realistic animations and game play will become more common as mobile phones become more powerful, much as we saw with gaming consoles. this is a bold investment in the future of mobile (and potentially smart TV) entertainment.

[Ygg2]

Innovation? Zynga? What exactly did they innovate, other than employee performance tracking software?

[panabee]

this acquisition is zynga investing in innovation.

[Ygg2]

I see. Corp speak - By aggressively optimizing our resource acquisition, we invest in solution innovation inflammation conflagration immolation.

[bronbron]

It's not at all corp speak... are you serious?

It's the same idea behind Facebook trying to buy Snapchat. Facebook realizes another team is much more innovative & successful than them in attracting young users, so they try and spend money to acquire that talent and invest in that team's innovative ability (pay $3B now to realize >$3B revenue in the future).

[product50]

Comparing Facebook to Zynga is like comparing an astronaut to a bed ridden granny. They may believe they have acquired something which is innovative and defensible - but the kind of morale and culture Zynga has will completely overpower anything they do. I will definitely be interested in seeing how many NaturalMotion employees stick around - I am assuming most of them got big payouts with 2 yr cliffs which is probably the only reason not to change.

Compare this to Facebook which has some of the best talent, culture and reputation of incrementally shipping out product.

[bronbron]

What does that have anything to do with what I said?

Are you seriously saying that Zynga can't follow the same line of reasoning that Facebook did in trying to acquire Snapchat? Or did you just go off on a tangent for no reason?

[panabee]

zynga knows it has an innovation problem. one way to jumpstart r&d and innovation is by acquiring talented engineers with impressive technology. by all accounts, naturalmotion offers both of these. rendering graphics more lifelike is very much one way to differentiate and innovate with games, and arguably the more defensible option. game mechanics can be cloned in a matter of months, if not weeks. however, as ea demonstrated with the madden and fifa franchises, mesmerizing graphics and lifelike animation cannot. they can help produce a high barrier to entry while advancing zynga's agenda of developing uniquely entertaining games.