In the past two weeks, shares of mobile game publisher Glu (GLUU) have tanked nearly 50%.  The business press have attributed the plunge to: 2008 guidance, revenue outlook, European troubles, brokerage cuts, take your pick.  The bottom line is that Glu was worth about 10 bucks a share last month, and now it is about half that.  This makes Glu a prime candidate for acquisition.

Glu is a really good mobile publisher, with strong studios, good distribution, terrific licenses, and up-and-coming internal IP.  With a market cap now at $157 million, cash reserves of $72m, and revenue of $63 million, this time is ripe for someone to acquire Glu for just 1.5X revenue.  This is a deal by any measure.

Who is in the market for a strong mobile division that could become instantly profitable after eliminating merger redundancies?  Warner Bros. has a relationship with Glu and recently acquired Travellers Tales.  WB has previously announced a $500m video games fund. Comcast is on the short list of media companies that lack a mobile branch.  IAC would benefit from mobile diversification. Heck, even EA would have made sense at one point, but Glu’s loss of Hasbro, and deals with EA’s rivals (Activision), would now curtail their interest. Microsoft has licensed them IP, and would benefit from an instant mobile infrastructure. 

And the long shot prediction to acquire Glu…(cue drumroll, hold envelope to forehead)…Popcap.  Popcap is swimming in cash, has games at Glu, and their concentration of Popcap casual game IP could make Popcap/Glu the #1 mobile publisher.