Shepherd and Wedderburn acts for deltaDNA in sale to Unity Technologies

Shepherd and Wedderburn acted for the shareholders in Scottish data analytics company deltaDNA in its sale to US-based game platform developer Unity Technologies. 

Edinburgh-based deltaDNA has developed a powerful data analytics engine for game developers that tracks the performance of games in real time, across mobile, PC, TV, and console play.

DeltaDNA said: “Joining Unity evolves the proposition yet again as we look to tie everything together across Unity’s Acquire, Engage, and Monetize functionalities.”

Unity said in a statement: “deltaDNA brings an important piece of this puzzle: highly customizable LiveOps to better understand and engage your players. They join Unity with nearly a decade of experience partnering with developers such as Viacom, Bandai Namco, and 505 Games.”

Unity Technologies is the developer of Unity, a cross-platform, real time game development engine - a rapidly growing segment of the video game industry estimated to be worth $174 billion globally in 2017, rising to $682 billion by 2025.

The acquisition of deltaDNA, the value of which is not disclosed, will allow Unity to offer game developers a staging platform with real time data analytics.

Stephen Trombala, Head of Corporate at Shepherd and Wedderburn, said: “deltaDNA, another notable Scottish tech success story, will augment the breadth of Unity's offering in the high-value global game platform industry."

“This transaction is a further endorsement of Edinburgh as a data and tech centre of excellence and is a further example of Shepherd and Wedderburn’s dominance in this sector and of our international transactional capabilities, including on recent deals for Epic, FanDuel, Fortinet, Hillhouse, Nucleus, S2G, and TVSquared.

“We wish the deltaDNA team every success as they expand their presence on the global stage.”

Commenting on Shepherd and Wedderburn’s role in the sale, deltaDNA Chairman Tim Christian said: “Stephen Trombala and his team are market leaders in technology transactions, with an unrivalled track record in delivering on complex, multi-jurisdictional deals.

“They worked tirelessly to deliver what is a transformational tie-up, both for deltaDNA and for Unity, in this fast-evolving global industry.

“The transaction heralds an exciting new era for deltaDNA, combining Unity’s global-leading development platform to populate more areas of games with player-specific content tracked with real-time analytics.”

The Shepherd and Wedderburn team acting for the shareholders in deltaDNA comprised Stephen Trombala, Keir Stewart and Jamila Archibald.

Unity were advised by Morrison & Foerster.