Dying Light 2 developer Techland paid more dividends to its CEO than it made in profits last year
A new report has suggested that Polish developer Techland, known for its work on Dead Island and Dying Light 2, has paid more in dividends to its CEO Paweł Marchewka than it made in net profits last year.
According to a report from Polish news site Strefa, as translated by DeepL, Techland paid over 600 million PLN ($151 million US) to Marchewka, in addition to over 300 million PLN ($75 million US) dividends paid in advance after last year's general meeting. That means that all up, Marchewka reportedly received over 900 million PLN ($225 million US), which is a pretty sizable amount, all things considered.
It gets even more absurd when you look at Techland’s profits from last year, however. The company reportedly brought in 1.12 billion PLN, with a net profit of 746 million PLN — over 150 million PLN, or $37 million US, less than it paid its CEO.
As noted by Strefa, the dividends paid out are the highest in games history for Poland, even higher than CD Projekt’s 500 million PLN dividends in 2020 after the release of Cyberpunk 2077. CD Projekt, unlike Techland, is publicly listed and likely has hundreds if not thousands of shareholders, meaning CD Projekt’s dividends paid were spread out across many people rather than just one primary shareholder.
While the distribution of its profits are a little surprising, Techland’s success since the release of Dying Light 2 doesn’t come as a shock. Despite a relatively subdued reaction from the press and very little buzz on social media, the zombie game went on to sell over 5 million copies in its first month in sales, and likely many more copies since then.
Techland didn’t just leave it be though, as it announced last month it was completely overhauling the Dying Light 2’s nighttime experience. One of the sore points for fans after the game’s release in February last year was that the game didn’t feel quite spooky enough at night, and the developer took that feedback to heart and created a massive free update to address just about every concern players had.
