Who Owns CD Projekt RED?
CD Projekt RED is a Polish video-game company owned largely by its co-founders, Michał Kiciński and Marcin Iwiński.
Dec. 10 2020, Published 12:19 p.m. ET
CD Projekt RED, a Polish-based video game company, was founded in 2002 in Warsaw. The studio's two co-founders of the studio, Michał Kiciński and Marcin Iwiński, worked in video game distribution in the 1990s in Poland. The company is best known for its original game, The Witcher.
The co-founders own a significant percentage of the company. The Witcher game has expanded into a widely popular trilogy. Its third installment, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, snagged several "Game of the Year" awards, according to Looper.
Is CD Projekt RED Polish?
CD Projekt Red started in Warsaw, Poland, under Polish game developers Kiciński and Iwiński. The Witcher, a role-playing game came out in 2007. Its sequel, The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings, hit the market in 2011 on PC and in 2012 on XBox 360.
The company’s mission is an ambitious one. CD Projekt RED's goal is “making the best video games on the planet.” PlayStationLifestyle reported in July that “no other title in the genre has quite reached the bar set by CD Projekt in Geralt’s final adventure,” referring to the third installment in The Witcher series.
Who are the CD Projekt RED owners?
Iwiński owns 12.79 percent of the company, while Kiciński has a 9.94 percent share of the company. Two other individuals have large shares — Piotr Nielubowicz with 6.81 percent and Adam Kiciński with 4.02 percent. The remaining 66.44 percent of the company is in free float.
On Dec. 9, CD Projekt RED launched its new game, the futuristic Cyberpunk 2077. The game, which had amassed 8 million pre-orders, disappointed many users. They complained about bugs interfering with the game's function.
Cyberpunk 2077 has been eight years in the making, so buyers have been anxiously waiting for it to launch. It had been slated for release on Nov. 19, but was delayed until Dec. 10. Shares of CD Projekt dropped by as much as 7.5 percent as malfunction complaints poured in about the new game.
Iwiński said that the company was working to repair glitches. He said, “We are looking at real-time gamers’ feedback and seeing if there are any repetitive problems and what should be fixed,” according to Bloomberg.
Matthew Kanterman, a Bloomberg Intelligence analyst, said that the pre-order numbers indicate that the new game could potentially sell 17 million units in the first two weeks. The projections would match the 2018 sales record set by Red Dead Redemption 2.
Mirabaud Studios analyst Neil Campling said that CD Projekt needs to fix the issues to keep the momentum going. He noted that the company will spend funds to “improve the current gameplay rather than moving on to an online, multiplayer version.”
CD Projekt AKCJE GPW
The WSE (Warsaw Stock Exchange) was listed on GPW on November 9, 2010. It's the biggest financial instruments exchange in Central and Eastern Europe.
The Warsaw Stock Exchange
The WSE started trading in 1991. Currently, it's the largest stock exchange in Eastern Europe. The state treasury founded the WSE not long after the overthrow of the Communist regime in Poland in 1989.
The Warsaw Stock Exchange operates two segments — a financial market and a commodities market. CD Projekt RED trades on the WSE, which is now part of GPW.