A senior company executive said on Tuesday that Sega is planning to acquire some other publishers in Europe and the States.

Sega has set a goal of becoming the No. 2 game publisher in the United States this year and vying for the No. 1 spot globally through fiscal 2004. Will they be able to make that? Well, it looks like it because the company's cash hoard is almost twice as large as the market capitalization of Acclaim Entertainment.

The most "interesting opportunities" for potential acquisitions were among the smaller, listed publishers that might provide development teams and intellectual property, such as rights to game franchises. Sega also said it plans to be more directly involved in the European market in 2003.

After a report in the Wall Street Journal Europe on Tuesday about Sega's plans, shares in Infogrames Entertainment rocketed 23 percent on speculation the company could be a take-over target. But an Infogrames spokeswoman declined to comment, citing company policy on market rumors.

An interesting fact is that Sega had been set to announce a deal with a game publisher at the industry's Electronic Entertainment Expo in May, but the agreement fell through. Was that the acquisition of Infogrames that fell trhough? Who knows..

To get a feel what Sega would have to pay for a publsiher, check out the following numbers. As of the close of trading on Tuesday, Acclaim had a market capitalization of $270.8 million, Midway had a capitalization of $196.7 million, Interplay had a market value of $29.8 million and 3DO's capitalization was $24.1 million.

And here is what Sega has got in their pockets. A 59.91 billion yen ($508 million) in long-term convertible debt as of the end of March, but it also had 62.76 billion yen ($532.2 million) in cash.

We will keep you updated as Sega starts to throw with cash!