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Lego is booming. Intricate model sets are treasured by enthusiasts, traditional building bricks are still manufactured in their billions, Lego films are smash hits at the box office, and the Pharrell Williams biopic Piece by Piece was even made in Lego.
But for two decades, Lego’s video games division has been outsourced.
The company originally made its own games, but farmed them out after it toyed with bankruptcy in the early 2000s.
Since then, licensed Lego games based on the likes of Harry Potter and Star Wars have gained a huge fanbase.
Now as revenues and profits rise, CEO Niels Christiansen tells the FT that lessons have been learned and Lego wants to move things in-house again.
It won’t be a given that Lego will be able to emulate the success of third-party developers but control seems key: the Legoland theme park empire was retaken through a consortium buyout in 2019.
