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YouTube to Acquire Videogame-Streaming Service Twitch for $1 Billion: Sources

Deal would be biggest ever for YouTube  —  Google's YouTube has reached a deal to buy Twitch, a popular videogame-streaming company, for more than $1 billion, according to sources familiar with the pact.

Variety Todd Spangler

Context & Ripple Effects

This would be YouTube's second defining acquisition. When Google bought YouTube back in 2007, it was betting on consumer video before anyone knew how it would pay off; seven years later, the reported more-than-$1-billion pact for Twitch — still unconfirmed, with the Wall Street Journal reporting talks at an early stage — would be the largest deal YouTube has ever done, aimed squarely at live gaming video rather than on-demand clips.

The story traveled fast: The Verge, the Wall Street Journal, Re/code, Forbes, Quartz and others all picked it up within a day, with Re/code arguing the fit makes sense (Twitch's live audiences complement YouTube's recorded catalog) and The Verge reporting that Twitch chose Google over multiple buyout offers, including one from Microsoft.

First-order effects

  • If the deal closes, Twitch's streamers and its live-chat infrastructure fold into Google's video operation, giving YouTube a live-gaming business it does not currently have while Twitch gains Google's ad sales and data-center scale.
  • Microsoft, which The Verge reports made an offer Twitch turned down, is left without its presumed live-streaming target and must find another route into game broadcasting.

Second-order effects

  • Rival platforms and publishers now have to price live game-streaming as a strategic asset rather than a niche: expect other suitors to chase remaining independent streaming properties, and broadcasters to weigh exclusivity deals against the reach of a combined YouTube-Twitch.
  • Game publishers and esports organizers gain leverage, since two deep-pocketed bidders competing for distribution rights can bid up licensing terms for tournaments and launch events.

Third-order effects

  • Live gaming video is on track to consolidate around a handful of scaled platforms, shifting power from individual streaming sites to whoever owns both the audience data and the ad infrastructure — with regulators likely to scrutinize any Google combination that concentrates online video further.
  • If the pattern holds, game broadcasting becomes bundled into broader video ecosystems the way search and social absorbed earlier content categories, narrowing the window for standalone streaming services to stay independent.

The trend: Live videogame-streaming is being pulled from independent startups into the orbit of the largest video platforms, with Google's reported Twitch bid the clearest marker yet of that consolidation.

Related: Twitch · YouTube · Google · Google moves YouTube ahead

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