Elon Musk has implied he’d purchase Hasbro to get the rights to D&D for his new AI gaming studio. I mean, what he did do was talk about D&D and then asked on X “how much is hasbro?”
So it was and was not a serious suggestion in my opinion. A lot of what he says seems meant to be taken both seriously and as humor which can be confusing for a lot of people.
But if Elon Musk were serious he wouldn’t exactly have much trouble acquiring Hasbro. The $11.5 billion Elon Musk would need to buy Hasbro is pretty much meaningless to him at this point so that’s not a problem. And pretty much any kind of defense Hasbro puts up can be overcome. And that’s even if they wanted to block an acquisition which is a big if for such a small company that would do better with more resources.
I think Elon Musk knows that Hasbro would not outright sell the rights to D&D to him, they might even reject just a license, and the only way to get the rights to D&D may be by purchasing the whole company.
Which would be a shame.
As numerous Magic the Gathering players have gone to point out supporting the wealthiest man in the world with their cardboard addictions is not something they signed up for.
Magic the Gathering players have also pointed out that Elon Musk’s treatment of LGBTQ issues does not align with the actual politics of the players of Magic, who are diverse in a general sense. Which is a good point and I can definitely see people quitting Magic because of Elon Musk’s asinine politics.
Hasbro owns a wide variety of intellectual property that would be valuable for a gaming company ranging from Magic the Gathering to Dungeons and Dragons to Transformers. So it’d make sense to buy Hasbro if Elon Musk were serious about launching an AI gaming company.
At the end of the day I don’t think Elon Musk would actually buy Hasbro. I don’t think he has the energy to run a toys and games company and I doubt he has someone lined up to be CEO instead of himself… it just doesn’t seem likely to happen. The world’s richest man can get his way if he wants but he probably doesn’t actually want to. That’s what you should take away.