GSBB Holdings

GSBB Holdings JV LLC is a joint venture between the Eclipse Group, OWL Ventures and Vuori, created to oversee the  and  brands.

History
The Eclipse Group started negotiations on acquiring GameStop Corp in August 2020, with Vuori offering to pay for GameStop's debt, which gave way to what came to be a joint venture. Vuori intends to acquire and run the physical locations under a new strategy which would see GameStop locations getting co-branded as Blockbusters. The joint venture almost didn't come to be, as OWL Ventures refused to sell or even license the brand at first. Vuori offered Discovery, while Eclipse offered its newly-acquired 40% stake in Epic Games (acquired from KPA after Tencent Games's overseas operations merged), but in the end, no sale was completed except for the Blockbuster brand which was first sold to Vuori and Eclipse.

The Blockbuster trademark is still licensed by TDC Group's subsidiary Nuuway in the Nordic countries for its streaming service. The only Blockbuster store not affected by the cobranding strategy is a store in Bend, Oregon, briefly recognized as the last Blockbuster location still open.

Vuori soon acquired, which was merged with  and  into the parent company, allowing the new GameStop/Blockbuster concept to expand to Australia, New Zealand and Thailand. The Video Ezy Express kiosks are planned to be rebranded as well, with the Blockbuster Express name in consideration. ,  &, and were also merged into their parent company, with their locations branded as GameStop/Blockbuster as well.

In January 2021, the stock for GSBB Holdings JV LLC skyrocketed, causing Melvin Capital, one of the minor shareholders, to go bankrupt. Illustrious (which absorbed Vuori and OWL Ventures earlier that month) announced this in a brief tweet afterwards, thanking Reddit users.

Future
Kasperi Salovaara, of Vuori, mentioned that since Blockbuster relied on late fees and GameStop relied on memberships and pop culture related sales, the new GameStop/Blockbuster concept was to be "deviant from the originals". They're planning to target an older audience, mainly adults of ages 18-45, and focus on sales of electronic accessories, quirky products (a la Vat19), movie and game rentals, as well as entertainment centers based on the presence of GameStop/Blockbuster. They also planned to expand into selling vinyl records.

After formation of the joint venture, GSBB Holdings founded a new subsidiary under Gametrust Games, named Blockbuster Films. It plans to co-acquire and co-distribute mid-to-low budget movies and develop scripts for film and television.

Vuori also plans to expand the concept to Brazil, Hong Kong, Japan, Mexico, Norway, Peru, Indonesia, Fiji, Malaysia and Singapore - these countries used to have either Video Ezys and/or Blockbusters locations. Vuori and Eclipse have also started negotiations on making a PC game streaming service under the GameStop name.