How long will it take Activision to get its money back after buying the Candy Crush Saga creator?

We found out today that Activision is buying Candy Crush Saga creator King.com for a whopping $5.9 billion.

That is an absurd sum. It's so big you might find yourself struggling to wrap your head around it.

Even so, it shouldn't take too long for Activision to get its money back. How long? We had a go at working it out.

First thing to note is that the data we've used for this sum is based on 2014 revenue figures. So, no, it won't be totally accurate. But it shouldn't be too far off either.

It's quite simple, really. In 2014, King.com made $2.4 billion in revenue.

Multiply that by two and you've already got $4.8 billion. We only need $1.1 billion to get the money back Activision invested.

Using our figures, another six months later and King.com would make $1.2 billion.

That's it, then: If the King.com revenue remains the same, Activision would make its money back in two and a half years.

Of course, as this is revenue, none of the costs of running King.com have been regarded here. So, actually, it will take a lot longer than that.

We can do better than that

One source reckons that King.com actually made $574.85 million in profit throughout 2014.

Given that the company made $127 million in profit in the first quarter of 2014, that figure seems plausible.

So let's use that as a basis and round it up to $575 million to make it easier.

After 10 years with a profit at $575 million King.com would have made Activision $5.75 billion. So we're looking at 10 years and a couple of months if nothing changes.

Quite a long time. But considering how much money we're talking about here that's hardly anything, really.

Not to mention that King.com's profits have been rising over the years. Presuming Activision doesn't royally screw things up it should make its money back in less than a decade.