Devolver Digital wants off the stock market — shareholders vote in September

Devolver Digital is pushing to delist from the London Stock Exchange and return to private ownership, five years after going public in November 2021. A shareholder vote is scheduled for 8th September at the company's annual general meeting, and if it passes, Devolver goes private on 16th September.

The numbers tell a brutal story. When Devolver listed in 2021, it was valued at £694.6 million — roughly $950 million. The share price has since collapsed by 96.27%, leaving the company worth around £34.64 million, or about $46.63 million. The board's filing is unusually candid about why: the videogame business runs on long-tail revenue and unpredictable release windows, which are fundamentally incompatible with the stock market's demand for "predictable, sequential growth." Devolver says it has faced pressure to hit short-term targets that don't reflect the actual long-term value of its portfolio. Going private is also expected to save the company around $1.6 million a year in compliance and administrative costs — and with trading volume on its shares already thin, staying listed offers little upside.

Devolver went public with CEO Douglas Morin promising it would "ensure our continued growth and support even more wonderful games" while retaining the studio's culture. That pitch hasn't aged well. The broader industry has been hammered since 2021 — widespread layoffs, studio closures, and platform consolidation have defined the post-COVID correction, as the pandemic-era spike in gaming growth gave way to a prolonged hangover. Devolver has kept publishing during this stretch, releasing games like Cult of the Lamb and Skate Story, but the market has shown little interest in rewarding that kind of long-tail, catalogue-driven business model.

A Devolver spokesperson put it plainly in a statement to GamesIndustry.biz: "Being private will allow the Devolver Digital team, especially the finance, legal, and executive team, to singularly focus on the long-term health of the company and less on satisfying the requirements of the public market, which have nothing to do with being a successful game publisher." If shareholders approve the move in September, Devolver becomes one of the more high-profile examples of a games company explicitly rejecting the public markets — and making a clear argument that shareholder pressure and creative publishing don't mix.