Game engine developer Unity Software ($U) went public on the New York Stock Exchange Friday. The San Francisco-based company's cross-platform gaming engine has fueled a boom in 3D game development, with a focus on mobile games and virtual reality content.
The company offered up 25 million shares and trading began at $75 per share as the market opened, up from its $52 initial listing price. The pop brought the company's market cap as high as $20 billion, closer to big-league game developers such as EA and Nintendo, although share price edged lower to $68 by the close of the trading day.
Unity says it isn't looking to be pigeon-holed in the gaming industry. As investors scramble to put money into tech stocks, the company is making the case that it spans multiple industries.
"We are in the gaming industry, but we're also in a lot of other industries," CFO Kimberly Jabal told Cheddar. "We have empowered creators. We've democratized game development, but we're not actually a gaming company. We're a technology company."
Jabal said Unity is creating solutions for all types of real-time 3D developers, not just gamers.
"We help them to design and to build their applications," she said. "Then we help them monetize and to operate and to grow their customer base."
Unity is also extending the benefits of the IPO to its employees by allowing them to sell 15 percent of their shares on the first day of trading, rather than after 180 days as is usually stipulated in public offerings.
"We wanted them to be able to sell right away," Jabal said. "They've been working hard, some of them for 15 years."
Stepping up a feud with Washington over technology and security, China's government on Sunday told users of computer equipment deemed sensitive to stop buying products from the biggest U.S. memory chipmaker, Micron Technology Inc.
Stocks are moving tentatively Monday, as Wall Street waits to see whether a pivotal meeting in the afternoon will help the U.S. government avoid a potentially disastrous default on its debt.
Scores of Boston University students turned their backs on the head of one of Hollywood's biggest studios, and some shouted “pay your writers,” as he gave the school's commencement address Sunday in a stadium where protesters supporting the Hollywood writers' strike picketed outside.
Gov. Ron DeSantis is asking that a federal judge be disqualified from the First Amendment lawsuit filed by Disney against the Florida governor and his appointees, claiming the jurist's prior statements in other cases have raised questions about his impartiality on the state's efforts to take over Disney World's governing body.
Ford CEO Jim Farley says the company will stop competing in over-served market segments and instead will place big bets on connected vehicles and digital services. The days of Ford being all things to all people are over, Farley said at the company's capital markets day event Monday.
The European Union slapped Meta with a record $1.3 billion privacy fine Monday and ordered it to stop transferring users personal information across the Atlantic by October, the latest salvo in a decadelong case sparked by U.S. cybersnooping fears.
Joanne Rodriguez, founder and CEO of Mycocycle Inc., joined Cheddar News to discuss how her company uses mushrooms to decarbonize construction waste. "Mycocycle was started to address the waste mismanagement issue we have," she said. "Globally, we've got overflowing landfills that are creating human and environmental health issues."
