Atari Interactive

About Atari Interactive

Atari Interactive, Inc. (formerly known as Infogrames Interactive, Inc. and Hasbro Interactive, Inc.) is an American subsidiary of Atari SA, formerly known as Infogrames Entertainment SA. The company was originally founded by toy company Hasbro in 1995 as Hasbro Interactive, and was sold to Infogrames at the beginning of 2001. Hasbro Interactive was formed late in 1995 to allow Hasbro to enter the video game market. Several Hasbro properties, such as Monopoly and Scrabble, had already been made into successful video games by licensees such as Virgin Interactive. With Hasbro's game experience, video games seemed like a natural extension of the company and a good opportunity for revenue growth. Hasbro Interactive's objective was to develop and publish games based on Hasbro properties. In January 1997, the company announced they would publish games for the PlayStation. By the middle of 2000, the dot-com bubble had burst, Hasbro share price had lost 70% of its value in just over a year and Hasbro would post a net loss for the first time in two decades. Faced with these difficulties, on December 6, 2000, Hasbro announced they would completely sell off their Hasbro Interactive division to French software company Infogrames. The sale included nearly all of their video game related rights and properties, the Atari brand and Hasbro's Games.com division, developer MicroProse and all of its software titles up to that point except for the Avalon Hill property. Hasbro Interactive's sale price was $100 million, $95 million as 4.5 million common shares of Infogrames and $5 million in cash. Under the terms of the sale agreement, Infogrames gained the rights to develop games based on Hasbro properties for a period of 15 years plus an option for an additional 5 years based on performance.[14] The deal was completed on January 29, 2001. Majesco had ended its relationship with Hasbro once Infogrames took over the gaming company. Following the purchase of the company, Infogrames renamed the company to Infogrames Interactive, Inc., alongside rebranding many of their subsidiaries under the name as well. In May 2003, with Infogrames planning to rebrand all their subsidiaries under the Atari brand name, the existing Atari Interactive, Inc. subsidiary was merged with Infogrames Interactive, Inc. and gained the Atari Interactive, Inc. name, being a wholly owned subsidiary of Infogrames Entertainment, SA (IESA). At the same time, the Infogrames, Inc. subsidiary licensed the Atari name and logo from Atari Interactive and changed its name to Atari, Inc. using it to develop, publish and distribute games for all major video game consoles and personal computers under the Atari brand. Atari SA still maintains ownership of the original Atari properties received through Hasbro which are kept in their Hasbro Interactive originated placeholder, Atari Interactive, Inc. On June 9, 2005, Hasbro bought back the digital gaming rights for their properties from IESA for $65 million. Within the deal, Hasbro purchased back the video game rights to Transformers, My Little Pony, Tonka, Magic: The Gathering, Connect Four, Candy Land and Playskool, while obtaining a 10-year exclusive deal to produce video games based on Monopoly, Scrabble, Game of Life, Battleship, Clue, Yahtzee, Simon, Risk and Boggle, alongside an expanded separate deal with the Dungeons & Dragons franchise. This ten-year deal excluding D&D was soon shortened, as on August 10, 2007, Hasbro announced they had signed a new casual game deal with Electronic Arts. On January 21, 2013, Atari, Inc. and Atari Interactive, Inc. (collectively, the "Companies") filed petitions for relief under Chapter 11, Title 11, United States Code in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York. All three Ataris emerged from bankruptcy one year later and the entering of the social casino gaming industry with Atari Casino.