VENTURE CAPITALIST FIRM EYES UP EIDOS
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[ March 18th 2005 ]

Online analyst Market Watch notes that a report in the Times of London has indicated $2.5 billion California venture capital firm Francisco Partners is considering making a bid for Britain's biggest computer game-maker and creator of the Lara Croft Tomb Raider titles, Eidos plc. Numerous suitors have been tapped as likely acquirers of the British publishing house, including UBI SOFT, EA and more recently Rupert Murdock's News Corp empire. Eidos has a further ten days to secure a buy-out offer before a golden parachute tendered by Royal Bank of Scotland expires.

Eidos confirmed during the release of the Company's interim results to December 2004 that "a proposal had been received on 2 March 2005 of a possible cash offer at a price of 53 pence per share, subject to one principal condition. However there can be no assurance that this condition will be satisfied and no certainty that an offer will be made nor as to the terms on which any offer might be made. This disclosure had not been made with the consent of the other party."