To play devil's advocate... Unity isn't close to profitable, and never has been. At some point money has to be made or the lights get turned off.
(† Yes, I know the growth potential from real-time to rendered. I still think it's a terrible investment.)
Unity used some of their tech in 2022 to create a demo with some lions in it.
The film was shot almost entirely in Unity, then the final render used some extra stuff and other tools. But the scenes, shots, etc were done in Unity. A quick google shows you this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WupuXjvO9uA Making of videos on Youtube, you see the Unity editor in many places while they film in VR
In contrast, Unreal Engine rendered scenes seems to be used in actual footages on some recent shows. Was Unity acquisitions of CGI firms meant to pursue this direction, or boost Unity editor usage during firm production like in Lion King?
It is possible but I don't know. Just was trying to point out that it's more than just some demo that it was used for.
This isn't really true though, their core business is and was profitable if you exclude all the of acquisitions junk, stock shenanigans, and loans to pay for it they have been doing.
It just didn't have the margins expected of a public company and so they did all that other junk to pump those numbers.
I implore devs to watch any of the business 101 class they think they’re too smart for
They pay their employees and executives in stock. They'd have to spend much more cash if they stopped doing that.
"We're profitable if you ignore all the things we're spending money on"
Not all the things, just their unprofitable side business attempts. It's like knowing a guy with a well paying job who always complains he is broke. But he conveniently never mentions that he's spending $4500 per month on a Lamborghini lease.
They are in the perpetual growth trap that so many of these companies fall into when they get bigger than a niche audience
Talk about the consequences of letting a bunch of incompetent MBAs loose at the top.
They had more than enough revenue to be profitable.
In many ways it's the best form of socialism, cheaper products and services provided to the people, paid for by investors who are rolling the dice on a pyramid scheme posing as a business model. Completely voluntary and works even within a capitalist system.
Now all we have to do is hope Unity goes under really quickly, then gets bought up for cheap by a business either willing to make far less as their investment was well below the cost of development for the tools... or that another sucker comes along to buy them at a higher price to either enter the market or expand their own dominance in it as they are still on their "chase growth" curve.