The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

I feel very comfortable working in a company where you can’t touch anything. — Walter Forbes At the beginning of 1996, Sierra On-Line was still basking in the success of the previous summer’s Phantasmagoria, the best-selling game it had ever published. With revenues of $158.1 million and profits of $16 million in 1995, the company was bigger and richer than it had ever been. In light of all this, absolutely nobody anticipated the press release that went out from Sierra’s new headquarters in Bellevue, Washington, on February 20. It announced that Sierra would soon “merge with CUC International, Inc., a technology-driven retail and membership-services company that provides access to travel, shopping, auto, dining, home-improvement, financial, and other services to 40 million consumers worldwide. Sierra stockholders will receive 1.225 shares of CUC common stock for each share of Sierra common stock. The transaction is valued at approximately $1.06 billion. The merger is subject to stockh ... Read full article.