Seemingly out of nowhere, Sony has announced brand new partnership with none other than Discord. Sony President and CEO Jim Ryan made the announcement in a special post stating that both companies have already started working together, with the intention of bringing the service to the PlayStation Network by next year. ” Our goal is to bring the Discord and PlayStation experiences closer together on console and mobile starting early next year, allowing friends, groups, and communities to hang out, have fun, and communicate more easily while playing games together” Ryan also mentioned that Sony made a “minority investment” in Discord during their most recent capital-raising round, putting an extra emphasis on the partnership.
While this is an exciting venture for both companies, neither one went into a great amount of detail about how this integration will work. It also wasn’t made clear just how long Sony and Discord have been working on the integration. Since this partnership was just announced, it’s more than likely that a plan of action or method has at least been discalced, but until we see something concrete, we probably won’t truly know the longevity of this project.
This announcement also comes not too long after it was revealed by The Wall Street Journal that Microsoft was in talks with Discord in regards to outright acquiring them. At first, it seemed like it would be done deal, until the same publication reported that Discord had ended talks with the corporation, halting the potential purchase. Discord is arguably the most dominant and most popular communication service software on the market today. It initially launched in late 2015, and as of the end of 2020 has reportedly more than 140 million users, the majority of which use it for playing games with others in an ease-of-access style.
One other possibility that Sony might use Discord is with their other huge acquisition this year, the Evolution Championship Series (EVO). Sony bought the entire event in March, shocking the gaming community in the process. The company could use Discord’s massive communication service and showcase tournament matches through it, in addition to their YouTube and Twitch platforms. It’ll be interesting to see how this new partnership progresses throughout the year, and hopefully, we’ll find out more sooner than later.