Unity shares down 13% on lowered 2022 guidance, merger agreement with IronSource

Shares of Unity fell 13% Wednesday morning after it lowered 2022 guidance and announced a merger agreement with IronSource.

IronSource shares surged nearly 50%. The company lets game developers manage advertising and marketing, and view engagement through dashboards and other tools that show how agame is performing.

In tandem with the merger announcement, Unity reduced full-year 2022 revenue guidance from $1.35 billion to $1.42 billion to $1.3 billion to $1.35 billion, citing the macroeconomic environment and "competitive dynamic" with monetizing. Shares of Unity are down about 76% year-to-date.

IronSource, valued at about $4.4 billion, will merge into a wholly-owned subsidiary of Unity via an all-stock deal. Each ordinary share of IronSource will be exchanged for 0.1089 shares of Unity common stock, the companies said.

After the deal completes, Unity stockholders will own roughly 73.5% of the combined company and current IronSource shareholders will keep about 26.5%. An up to $2.5 billion share buyback program will be effective when the transaction is closed, Unity said.

"The combination of Unity and ironSource better supports creators of all sizes by giving them all the tools they need to create and grow successful apps in gaming and other consumer-facing verticals like e-commerce," said John Riccitiello, CEO of Unity. "This is a step further toward realizing our vision of a fully integrated platform that helps creators in every step of their RT3D journey."