SCi Announces Termination Of Takeover Talks

In a message released to the London Stock Exchange, UK-headquartered published SCi Entertainment, which owns Tomb Raider creator Eidos Interactive, has announced that it has terminated all discussions in relation to takeover talks for the company. Over the past few months, SCi has been happy to confirm rumors that un-named companies were in negotiations for a takeover, previous commenting: "In October 2005, the Board of SCi announced that it had received approaches that may or may not lead to an offer for the Group". These rumors pushed the company's shares higher, but with the announcement that: "The Board does not believe that it is in the Company's or the shareholders' interests to prolong talks any further", this effect may now be at an end - SCi's shares were still up somewhat at UKP4.90 ($8.61) in today's trading, however. In making the statement, SCi also added: "The integration of SCi and Eidos has been successfully completed and the Group remains on track to achieve its financial targets for the year to 30 June 2006. As recently reported the level of sales activity in the first half of the financial year exceeded UKP40 million. This is approximately UKP15 million better than the Group's internal budget." The firm's major release in the next few months is the Crystal Dynamics-developed Tomb Raider: Legend, for which initial buzz appears positive, and the company will be hoping that its revenues will replace those from Eidos' best recent deal, the distribution for popular Traveller's Tales/Giant Interactive title Lego Star Wars, for which LucasArts will now be publishing a prequel. In related news, Eidos and SCi announced the new real-life face of Lara Croft, 20-year-old Londoner Karima Adebibe, with Eidos' Matt Gorman commenting tartly: "Karima has all the assets needed to accurately portray the world's favourite female action hero."