Pearl Abyss Sells EVE Online Studio for $120M, Half of What It Paid

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Pearl Abyss, the company behind the game Crimson Desert, has agreed to sell EVE Online developer CCP Games back to its CEO, Hilmar Veigar Pétursson, for around $120 million (177.1 billion Korean won). According to a report in Digital Today, the sale was expected to be completed on May 6, 2026, and will involve $100 million in cash plus $20 million in acquisition rights for digital tokens.

The final sale price is less than half of the $225 million Pearl Abyss initially paid for CCP in 2018, plus potential additional payments of up to $200 million based on performance. Pearl Abyss’s eight years of ownership were difficult, as CCP consistently lost money – even after receiving an extra $50 million investment, they reported a $19 million operating loss in 2024. It’s currently unclear how the buyout was financed, what CCP’s budget will be moving forward, or how they plan to pay off the remaining $50 million debt.

A Pearl Abyss representative explained to Inven Global that the company considered several options for future growth before deciding that a management buyout was the best path forward for everyone involved. They stated that buying the company in 2018 was a good move at the time, helping them gain valuable game properties and expand their business. However, the global gaming market and the company’s goals have changed considerably since then.

CCP has confirmed the ownership change in a statement to GamesIndustry.biz, explaining that it won’t affect their employees, games, or future development. They plan to share more information once all legal requirements are completed.

The $20 million in tokens appears to be connected to CCP’s blockchain-based survival game, EVE Frontier. Last year, CCP secured $40 million in funding for the project, with Andreessen Horowitz and Bitkraft leading the investment. A large portion of this funding came through these tokens. Currently, players can access an early version of EVE Frontier by purchasing “Founder Access.” The game’s terms of service mention “Alpha Tokens” which operate on the blockchain, but explicitly state that CCP isn’t responsible for their value or nature, as permitted by law.

CCP, the creators of the long-running space game EVE Online, are working on a new game called EVE Vanguard. This will be an ‘extraction shooter’ – a type of game where players complete missions and then try to safely ‘extract’ with their rewards – and is planned for release in the third quarter of 2026. Players will get a chance to try it out in a public trial in October 2025. EVE Online itself still brings in a significant amount of revenue for its parent company, Pearl Abyss – around one-third of their total income, with the rest coming from their other major game, Black Desert. Before being acquired in 2018, CCP had previously attempted to create two shooter spin-off games, but both were cancelled.

Analysts see Pearl Abyss’s sale of CCP as a smart move, allowing the company to invest more in its own games. With Crimson Desert selling over five million copies worldwide since its March 2026 release, Pearl Abyss plans to use the money from the sale to develop and promote games like DokeV, and they’re still open to working with CCP in the future. The sale is happening right before EVE Fest, the EVE Online fan convention, which starts on May 14, 2026.

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2026-05-07 20:46