Thursday’s rumor that Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) is looking at buying a Chinese mobile games company may have been lent credence by comments from an exec of the supposed acquisition target. But if management keep speaking publicly about it like this, will any deal happen at all?
“We should have a decision in about one or two months. They’re still talking about it and it’s not quite settled yet right now,” Tian Bo, operations VP for online games maker Handseeing tells Reuters.
The way Bo puts it to China’s state news agency Xinhua, Apple and Handseeing are “negotiating the acquisition price and other details”, with talks due for conclusion by September: “The acquisition price is at the core of our current talks. No final price has been yet agreed.”
What, if anything, would Apple want with Handseeing? Though it would be Apple’s first Chinese acquisition, it could also help it tool up for Game Center, its planned social online mobile gaming service. At least, that’s the theory put to Xinhua by an unnamed Handseeing “game engineer”.
But is linking Apple to Handseeing just an attempt to hike the price to other interested parties? “(Bo) said several other foreign companies had also showed interest in investing in or cooperating with Handseeing,” Xinhua says.
Fair to say Apple isn’t commenting and, if and when anything concrete happens, we’ll update.