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What has to happen in Create Solutions

Model as of

This page changes Create Solutions inside the complete U model. Every other vertical, corporate programme and valuation assumption stays in the selected portfolio case.

U forward model
Horizon
Consolidated fair value $65.13 all other verticals held in this portfolio case
Final-quarter revenue $274M 23% of company revenue
Explicit segment contribution $1.31B EBITDA less segment capex, before corporate items

Not a forecast: a dated, filed, board-set statement of what the people with the most information consider a stretch outcome. On 17 August 2026, eleven days after the result, Unity's compensation committee granted the chief executive 880,000 price-vesting RSUs in three tranches, each requiring a 30-consecutive-day VWAP above $50, $60 and $75 inside a performance period ending 17 August 2031. Against the $46.16 close of 24 August 2026 those are +8%, +30% and +62%, and the top hurdle sits above the highest published Street target after the quarter ($55, Piper Sandler, 7 August 2026). This case asks what operating path would put the equity there, at half the bull case's growth lift and 22x exit EBITDA. It clears the first two hurdles and stops short of the third: it prints a fair value in the middle sixties, comfortably past $50 and $60 and well below $75, so on this model's arithmetic the top tranche needs the bull case rather than this one. What it does not offer is any claim about probability - the award vests on price and service, carries no revenue or margin condition at all, and the board published no operating plan alongside it.

Create Solutions

Basis quarter$158M
Final quarter$274M
Implied CAGR+12%
Final revenue mix23%

The Unity engine and everything sold around it: Unity Pro and Enterprise subscription seats, enterprise support and strategic partnerships, cloud and hosting consumption, and non-gaming RT3D licences. Unity spent 2024 and 2025 deliberately shrinking this line by cutting professional services and non-core consumption, and it has stabilised near $155m a quarter with subscription growth offsetting the runoff. It is not the growth story; it is why the growth story has a moat, because the engine generates the runtime behavioural data the Vector bidding model trades on.

Last four quarters
2025 Q3 $152M Reported
2025 Q4 $165M Estimated
2026 Q1 $157M Reported
2026 Q2 $158M Reported
Subscription seats and enterprise supportCloud and hosting consumption servicesIndustry (non-gaming RT3D) licences
Sequential growth +2.1%/qtr decaying toward +1.5% +2.15% lands 2026 Q3 on $161.0m, the midpoint of the guided $159-163m Strategic Create range.
Create Solutions

Latest: $274M (2031Q2E)

Period Value
2023Q1 $187M
2023Q2 $193M
2023Q3 $189M
2023Q4 $290M
2024Q1 $164M
2024Q2 $151M
2024Q3 $147M
2024Q4 $152M
2025Q1 $150M
2025Q2 $154M
2025Q3 $152M
2025Q4 $165M
2026Q1 $157M
2026Q2 $158M
2026Q3E $162M
2026Q4E $167M
2027Q1E $172M
2027Q2E $177M
2027Q3E $182M
2027Q4E $187M
2028Q1E $192M
2028Q2E $197M
2028Q3E $203M
2028Q4E $208M
2029Q1E $214M
2029Q2E $220M
2029Q3E $226M
2029Q4E $233M
2030Q1E $239M
2030Q2E $246M
2030Q3E $252M
2030Q4E $259M
2031Q1E $267M
2031Q2E $274M

Assumptions & reasoning

  • Unity on the basis quarter: 'Create Solutions revenue was $158 million, up 2% year-over-year. The increase was driven by increases in subscription revenue, partially offset by decreases in cloud and hosting services revenue, driven by our portfolio reset in 2025.' The growth is subscription; the drag is a consumption tail that is nearly exhausted.
  • The 2025 Q2 comparative carries roughly $12m of one-time term-licence revenue. Unity said Strategic Create grew 14% year over year excluding it, against the 5% headline, so reading the basis quarter's 2% year-over-year print as the run rate understates the underlying line.
  • Three quarters in this history are derived, not reported: 2023 Q4, 2024 Q4 and 2025 Q4 are each the full year less the nine months reported in that year's third-quarter 10-Q. They are marked estimated. 2023 Q4 also contains roughly $99m of Weta FX contract-termination revenue, which is why it is nearly twice the surrounding quarters and why it is excluded from the seasonality work.
  • Remaining performance obligations were $494m at 31 December 2025, relating primarily to Create Solutions subscriptions, Enterprise Support and Strategic Partnerships, of which roughly $225m was expected to be recognised within a year. That is the closest thing Unity publishes to a Create backlog, and it is an annual disclosure, not a quarterly one.
  • No seasonality is applied. On a ratio-to-centred-moving-average decomposition the window-to-window spread exceeds the signal in three of four quarters and the two clean windows disagree in sign on both Q1 (1.066 in 2024 against 0.968 in 2025) and Q4 (0.991 against 1.061). What looks like a Q4 lift is the 2023-to-2024 portfolio-reset decline, a trend rather than a season. Rateably recognised subscription revenue should not carry a quarterly shape, and it does not.
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