AT&T lined up a sale of WarnerMedia’s mobile game studio Playdemic to Electronic Arts for $1.4 billion, the operator’s latest move to offload a non-core asset to fund network investment and debt reduction.

The deal means Playdemic will not be included in a planned tie-up of WarnerMedia with pay-TV company Discovery, which is scheduled to complete in 2022 and could net AT&T $43 billion.

Playdemic is best known for Golf Clash, a popular mobile game pitching players against randomly-assigned opponents in real time.

It is available on iOS, Android and Facebook. The companies said it had been downloaded more than 80 million times since its launch in 2017.

WarnerMedia explained it wants to narrow the focus for its games division.

David Haddad, president of the unit said the “decision to divest is a part of our overall strategy to build games based on Warner Bros. storied franchises”.

AT&T has been offloading non-core assets as part of a strategy to focus on its wireless and fibre businesses.

In addition to Playdemic and WarnerMedia, AT&T also agreed to spin off DirecTV in a $7.6 billion transaction expected to close this year.