Paintball Magazine February 2019 | Page 56

Another Corporate Buyout? When CM Support (Viewloader) sold to Brass Eagle for a reported 5 million dollars in January of 1999, it started a snowball effect in paintball that has yet to stop. Take a look at the timeline on some of the industry’s biggest and most influential corporate acquisitions. • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • . CM Support (Viewloader sold to Brass Eagle in January of 1999 National Paintball Supply purchased Paintball 2Xtremes Magazine in 2000 Brass Eagle acquired JT Paintball in 2002 then merged with K2 Inc. in 2004 Summit Partners acquires Tippmann Pneumatics (Now Tippmann Sports) in 2004. National Paintball Supply merged with PMI then sold to Angelo, Gordon & Company in 2006. The company name was then changed to KEE Action Sports In 2007 Jarden Corporation acquires K2 Inc. (and with it Worr Game Products, Viewloader and JT Paintball) KEE Action Sports purchased Jarden’s paintball assets – Worr Game Products, Brass Eagle, Viewloader and JT Paintball in 2010. In 2011 GI Sportz (previously known as GI Milsim) acquired Procaps. The media company “CrowdGather” acquired PbNation in 2011. KEE Action Sports acquired Kingman (Spyder) in 2013. Valken Sports acquired Sly Paintball in 2013. GI Sportz announced it acquired Tippmann Sports in December of 2013. Pbnation is sold again, this time to VerticalScope. Fulcrum Capital Partners purchased a majority share of GI Sportz in 2015 In July of 2015 GI Sportz acquired KEE Action Sports and all of their paintball brands (Empire Paintball, Kingman, JT Paintball, Worr Game Products, etc.). Prediction: 2019 will bring news of another major paintball company buyout. This one will come as a shock to players everywhere, though whispers of this have been circulating in the industry for nearly a year. 056 paintball.media magazine