Unity seeks $125 million in new round of funding

Unity Technologies is seeking $125 million in a new round of funding, which could double the company’s valuation to nearly $6 billion, according to a report from TechCrunch. This is the third funding round in three years for Unity, with the previous rounds bringing in $181 million in July 2016, and $400 million in May of last year.

Given the frequency and amount of these funding rounds, rumors have circulated that Unity was planning to follow in the footsteps of its main competitor Epic Games and enter the game development and publishing arena. In GDC interview with GamesIndustry, Unity CMO Clive Downie shot down those rumors, however. For now, Unity seems to be satisfied with the fact that nearly half of all games are built with the Unity 3D engine.

Another report claims that Unity is planning on leveraging its new valuation in order to go public next year. Unity has not offered any commentary on this rumor, however, so this claim is simply hearsay at this point.

Unity’s newest round of funding is coming on the heels of a very public spat with SpatialOS creator Improbable. The disagreement between Unity and Improbable resulted in Epic Games and Improbable teaming up to offer incentives for developers to move away from Unity to Epic’s Unreal Engine.

The move was just one in a string of significant business moves for Epic over the last year; it acquired Rocket League developer Psyonix earlier this month, and also bought Cloudgine and 3Lateral earlier this year. Given Epic’s recent activity, and the huge success of Fortnite, Unity may be planning to use this new round of funding to bolster itself for increased competition.

Whatever the intentions, Unity’s tenacious drive for new funding is sure to have a far-reaching impact on the games industry. The competition between Unity and Epic reached a new high in January thanks to the Improbable debacle, so moving forward it should be interesting to see how the two businesses circle each other. Competition is always good for the industry, and hopefully consumers see some benefit in one form or another.