Sony Interactive Entertainment has made a minority investment in Discord, the VoIP, instant messaging and digital distribution platform. This investment is a part of a deal between both the companies to tie in Discord services into Sony’s PlayStation gaming division.
Sony is looking to integrate Discord services into the PlayStation Network next year, it announced in a blog post. The company has not revealed an exact timeline for when the integration will be made.
Neither company has disclosed the value of the investment or the exact nature of the partnership. The deal has been announced after Discord reportedly ended its sale talks with Microsoft, as it wanted to focus on expanding its business as a standalone company.
To recall, Sony already offers voice chat capability to its PSN users through built-in social tools. However, this comes nowhere close to the capabilities and features Discord has to offer.
Discord currently has over 140 million global monthly users. It allows its users to create public and private groups to gather and chat via text, audio and video.
“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,” Sony Interactive Entertainment Chief Executive Officer Jim Ryan said in the announcement blog post.
Discord already has an active partnership with Microsoft for its Xbox gaming platform. However, that partnership is limited to profiles. Sony’s new partnership is aimed at deeper integration, which will allow PlayStation users to have a better gaming experience.
