It’s no secret that, over the years, there have been multiple companies that have wanted to acquire Nintendo. The most notable of those companies is Microsoft. However, it isn’t just video gaming companies that have done this. Nintendo’s reputation is so high that even companies that have little interest in the video gaming industry as a whole have expressed interest in buying them.
For example, Activision founder Bobby Kotick was recently a guest on the Grit podcast. There, he revealed that conglomerate company Berkshire Hathaway had expressed interest in buying Nintendo. At the time, Vivendi had been forced to sell Activision and Berkshire Hathaway was one of the companies interested in buying it. In fact, Kotick specifically mentions vice chairman Charlie Munger being the one that had brought up the matter.
Kotick said that “he goes, ‘You know, I was looking at a couple other companies in your sector. I think if we bought yours, we should buy that company Nintendo, too’”. He said, ‘Have you guys looked at it? I was like, ‘Yeah.’ It was trading [at the time] at like 13 billion, with 7 billion in cash. He goes, ‘You know, I don’t think anything is gonna go really bad before I’m dead, and then if it goes bad after I’m dead, they’ll just chalk it up to the folly of an 82-year-old, so you don’t have to be so concerned about disappointing me.’”
Obviously, Berkshire Hathaway never bought Nintendo. In fact, they didn’t buy Activision either. Activision eventually merged with Vivendi to create Activision-Blizzard, and it would ultimately be Microsoft that bought them. A big reason for this is because Munger, as Kotick explained, “didn’t like the business [of video games]. He thought it was a step removed from gambling. He’s like, ‘You know, you’re preying off people’s addictions.’ And I was like, ‘I’m not. I’m actually giving them joy and fun, and if you ever tried a video game, you’d see that.’ He always had this… little bit of an aversion”.
As for Munger, he would eventually pass away in 2023 at the age of 99. Kotick, meanwhile, would become the CEO of Activision-Blizzard. The same year Munger passed away, Kotick retired. Since then, Berkshire Hathaway has not expressed any interest in buying any video gaming companies.
