Valve Corporation is an American video game developer, publisher, and digital distribution company founded in 1996 by former Microsoft employees Gabe Newell and Mike Harrington in Kirkland, Washington. Valve is best known for creating Steam, the world's largest digital distribution platform for PC gaming, which hosts tens of thousands of games and boasts hundreds of millions of registered accounts. The company has developed critically acclaimed game franchises including Half-Life, Portal, Counter-Strike, Dota 2, Left 4 Dead, and Team Fortress. Valve pioneered the modern digital game distribution model with Steam, fundamentally transforming how games are sold and played on PC. The company has also ventured into hardware with the Steam Deck handheld gaming PC, the Valve Index VR headset, and the Steam Controller. Valve operates with a famously flat organizational structure and is one of the most profitable companies per employee in the United States. Despite being privately held, Valve is estimated to be worth tens of billions of dollars, driven primarily by Steam's dominant position in the PC gaming marketplace.

Gaming Brands

Valve is the creator of Steam, the world's largest PC gaming platform, and developer of iconic franchises like Half-Life, Portal, Counter-Strike, and Dota 2, as well as the Steam Deck handheld gaming PC.