Unity announced it will acquire Weta Digital, a legendary visual effects company founded by Peter Jackson, for $1.625 billion.
You've probably seen Weta Digital's work, regardless of whether you know the name. If you're looking for a movie that people recommend seeing in theaters, there's a good chance Weta Digital was involved in the VFX.
Weta Digital, a group of visual effects artists and engineers who developed many of the tools used by artists, was a key part of this deal. Unity will acquire these tools and engineering teams; the visual effects artistry group will be split into its own thing.
Unity will be joined by Weta Digital's 275+ employees. Peter Jackson will retain the majority of "Weta FX", where the VFX artists will be split out. Both companies plan to continue their collaboration, with Unity noting its belief that Weta FX is one of the "largest customers" in the Media and Entertainment sector moving forward.
Unity will take over the development of Weta Digital’s many built-in tools. These include City Builder, which procedurally creates large 3D cities in movies like King Kong), Manuka, their custom, physics-simulating rendering engine that makes everything look so real in the final version, Gazebo (their quicker real-time renderer that allows artists to preview scenes before they are rendered in full), and all the other bespoke tech the team built.
Why Weta? To get his thoughts, I called Unity SVP Marc Whitten.
He said, "Think back to 10 years ago." Think about 2D and how many photos were created. It was likely quite a lot. However, if you look ahead ten years, it's much more. We're all in the same place when it comes to 3D.
He says that the only difference is that he thought he could take photos 10 years ago. I can do some things with 2D. This is almost impossible to believe. Every time I press the shutter button on my phone, 5 million lines of code are running to make me [a photographer]. However, 3D modeling is something I can't do right now. We need to follow the same approach over the next 10 year: to take this extremely deep technology and ensure that it works seamlessly.
This means that Unity is increasingly aware of the need to make 3D building easier, something Weta spent decades trying to figure out.
Unity will also be purchasing the vast collection of digital assets Weta Digital built over the years. This includes everything from 3D models and people to algorithms that determine how smoke reacts when it rains, to simulations of how animals move through trees, all of which could potentially find their way into Unity's products. Whitten points out that this won't include any "recognizably distinct IP", so don't expect to be in a position to drag and drop Gollum into your next game.
Unity's previous largest acquisition was the $320M Parsec purchase in August 2012. Whitten referred to the Parsec purchase at that time as part of Unity’s larger cloud ambitions, something this acquisition also plays to.
Whitten says, "What [Weta Digital] tools are...is really this pipeline." Each tool has its own power, but when they are used together in this pipeline, they work seamlessly. You can make changes in one tool and it will show up when you try to change the lighting or compositing in another tool. Working together can be very easy for groups of people.
He said, "What we'll then do is make sure these cloud capabilities plug directly into where artists are and how they're trying their work -- inside Maya, inside Houdini or inside Unity."
"We believe it is important to make the pipeline available in cloud so that you can plug into it from wherever you are."
Unity claims that the deal will close during its 2021 quarter. Prem Akkaraju, CEO of Weta Digital, will continue as CEO of Weta FX. Joe Marks, CTO of Weta Digital will be moving to Unity.
