profit
Latest
Dear Esther turned a profit in just 5 hours, 30 minutes
Last year Indie Fund voted to support Dear Esther, a rebuild of the popular Half-Life 2 mod, and it gave developer thechineseroom $55,000 in one lump sum. Indie Fund had its reservations: In an email to thechineseroom's Dan Pinchbeck before handing over the money, Indie Fund said the Steam audience may not understand Dear Esther and it proposed a release on PSN instead. This didn't happen, and thankfully so.Dear Esther recouped Indie Fund's $55,000 investment yesterday in just 5 hours and 30 minutes, selling 16,000 copies and becoming the top-selling title on Steam for the entire day. This means all the sales now are going directly to thechineseroom, whether to fund another game, add to this one or take a team-building sky-diving trip, we'll have to wait and see.
Namco Bandai profits up in Q3 2012, as are year-end projections
Namco Bandai's financial statement for the third quarter of fiscal 2012 has been released, and while the report contains a lot of tables and numbers and figures, it actually has very few pictures, which was a problem for our exceedingly limited attention spans. We did our best, though, and after concentrating really hard and taking our Adult ADD medication, we were able to produce actual, honest-to-goodness business information.For instance! For the 9 month period ending on December 31, 2011, Namco Bandai reports a net income (which is the amount of earned money left over after all operating expenses and taxes) of ¥16.3 billion, or about $210 million, which is a 34.3 percent increase over the same period last year.The company predicts an additional ¥2.19 billion ($28.3 million) in net income over the course of Q4, (which runs from January 1 to March 31, 2012), wrapping up fiscal 2012 to the tune of ¥18.5 billion ($238.4 million) in net profit over the course of the fiscal year. Provided these predictions stand the test of time, Namco Bandai's performance in fiscal 2012 will be a 90 percent increase over its performance in fiscal 2011.Whew! Now if you'll excuse us, we have cat videos to watch.
Lenovo releases Q3 earnings report, shipments rise, profits soar
Lenovo turned in another stellar earnings report yesterday, following up on a huge Q2 with an encouraging Q3. For the fiscal quarter ended December 31st, the PC maker saw its net profits reach $153 million, marking a 54 percent increase over last year's $99.7 million. Revenue also rose 44 percent last quarter to a record $8.4 billion, thanks in large part to a surge in PC sales. In mature markets, Lenovo saw revenues increase by a whopping 81 percent to $3.6 billion, while emerging market sales reached $1.3 billion, marking a 13 percent rise over the previous year and accounting for about 15 percent of the company's global revenue. The manufacturer saw particularly strong growth in China, where it now enjoys a market share of 35.3 percent, its highest ever. Lenovo attributed much of this to strong smartphone and tablet sales in China, while confirming plans to release a Smart TV within the country, as well (according to CEO Yang Yuanqing, it should hit the market in April). Laptops, however, remain the company's bread and butter, comprising 53 percent of its total revenue last quarter, with sales reaching $4.5 billion -- 30 percent higher than last year. For more numbers, check out the full press release, after the break.
Sprint announces Q4 2011 results: the iPhone brings in 720,000 new customers
Following its bittersweet Q3, the latest financial report from Sprint this quarter offers up another mixed bag of news. Net operating losses totalled $438 million, more than the $139 million posted in the same quarter last year. It suffered a staggering $1.3 billion net loss (much of that due to upfront costs associated with launching the iPhone), dwarfing the Q3's $301 million losses. Operating revenue increases were, however, the largest in the last five years, up to $8.72 billion from $8.3 billion. Net subscribers now total 55 million, with 33 million postpaid, 14.8 million prepaid and around 7.2 million arriving from wholesale, adding an extra 1.6 million Sprint customers in the last quarter. This was also the first time in a long while that new subscribers on the Sprint platform outpaced losses at the Nextel and wireline businesses. Sprint hoped to see its iPhone draw customers into its network, putting it toe-to-toe with the bigger carriers, and it largely did, with 40 percent of the 1.8 million iPhones sold landing directly in the hands of new customers. However, the higher subsidy costs of the iPhone was also responsible for these tougher financial results. Last year also saw the tentative launch of Sprint's LTE network, and that's where the future appears to be for the carrier, with its forward-looking statement hinging on exactly how fast they're able to grab the 4G bull by the horns and get it into their customers' hands. Compatibility with Clearwire's next generation network is mentioned here, as is the "financial performance of Clearwire and its ability to build, operate, and maintain its 4G network." Lightsquared, however, was conspicuously absent from Sprint's future machinations.
Microsoft's $21B in quarterly revenue is nice, but it's no iPhone
When you think Microsoft, you think "big." Especially from the perspective of Apple's long-time customers and loyalists -- those who remember the rough times in the 1990s, when Microsoft's US$150 million investment helped keep the company from fiscal ruin -- the idea of corporate behemoth-ness is paired irrevocably with Redmond's mastery of the Windows ecosystem. It was Microsoft's dominance of the computer industry that led a federal judge to declare that the company had "monopoly power" in 1999. Correspondingly, the revenues and profits generated by the Windows juggernaut equate to the biggest of big money. At least, pretty big money. In responding to Ed Bott's ZDnet article about the relative distribution of profits among the various business lines at three tech leaders (Google, Microsoft and Apple; Bott's point was that Google's cash comes almost exclusively from advertising, while Apple and Microsoft have more balance), MG Siegler noted that the pretty pie charts were missing a key piece of context. Apple's revenues and profits may weigh heavily on the iPhone, it's true, but what's not apparent from the side-by-side comparison is the scale. It's not just that Apple is doing better than Microsoft in revenues, profits and market cap. It's not just that Apple earned and kept more than twice as much as Microsoft did in the holiday quarter. It's that the most successful Apple product, considered as a standalone business, is larger than Microsoft all on its own. No, that's not a typo. In the quarter ending December 31, the iPhone rang up sales of more than $24 billion. All of Microsoft's businesses -- Windows, Office, Xbox, enterprise, consumers, the whole shebang -- chalked up almost $21 billion in revenues. Yes, Microsoft's strongest quarter for business sales may not be the one where IT purchasers are more focused on Christmas vacation than server upgrades. But it's still a breathtaking fact, and a striking transition from a decade ago. [Hat tip to Business Insider]
Square Enix thanks games for 2011's rise in revenue, profit
Deus Ex is leading the revenue revolution for Square Enix, whose digital entertainment -- games -- department in April-December 2011 grew 6.2 percent from the previous fiscal year, totaling $704.7 million in net sales. Games now comprise 56 percent of Square Enix's total revenue, where in the same period of 2010 they made up just 52 percent.The company's operating profit rose 11.5 percent to $169.4 million and its net income ended at $65 million, up 175.2 percent from the previous period. Square Enix cited Deus Ex: Human Revolution and its online and social titles as the main factors behind its financial progress.
Nikon posts Q3 2011 earnings, sees significant losses due to Thailand floods
Nikon posted its Q3 earnings report this morning, and there isn't a whole lot to smile about. The cameramaker had to swallow a one-off loss of ¥10.9 billion last quarter (approximately $143.1 million), due to widespread flooding that devastated its Thailand manufacturing plant, in October. Today's report comes just a day after Sony issued similarly dire figures, which it largely attributed to last year's flooding, as well. For the third quarter ended December 31st, Nikon posted a ¥3.7 billion loss (about $48.6 million), compared with the ¥9.7 billion ($127.3 million) it saw in net profits over the same period in 2010. Operating profits also fell to ¥8.2 billion from ¥18.6 billion in 2010, while total revenue dropped from ¥253.8 billion in Q3 2010 to ¥215.4 billion, last quarter. The company remains optimistic about the future, though, forecasting net gains of ¥55 billion this year, coupled with an expected revenue of ¥925 billion. For the full report, check out the source links below.
Sharp struggles with TV competition, Q3 2011 results reveal 86 percent drop in profit
It's pretty tough out there for TV manufacturers. Sharp's reporting its financial results for April-December last year, announcing a profit of 9.14 billion yen ($120 million), a drop of 57.37 billion yen since the same period in 2010. Despite announcing a whole gang of new displays for the year, Sharp has cut its profit forecast correspondingly, down to zero for March 2012. According to Reuters, the company was expected to post healthier results, having recently finished a new manufacturing plant and apparently strong demand for its high-end AQUOS TVs, although it's perhaps not strong enough.
Fujitsu slashes profit target by 42 percent, blames Thai floods
NEC revealed its financial woes to the world yesterday and now Fujitsu is doing the same. The Japanese computer giant originally expected to make ¥60 billion ($790 million) in the fiscal year ending March 31st, but its latest estimate suggests ¥35 billion ($460 million) may be closer to the mark. Whereas NEC admitted there'd been a fall in demand for its products, Fujitsu has so far put the blame squarely on the recent flooding in Thailand, which hit PC sales by disrupting supplies of HDDs.
Canon announces middling Q4 2011 earnings report, president steps down
In the wake of a relatively strong Q3, Canon today unveiled a slightly less rosy earnings report for the fourth quarter of 2011. Net sales for the quarter reached ¥964.8 billion (about $12.6 billion), up from the ¥916 billion the company reported last quarter, but down about 9.7 percent from Q4 2010. Quarterly operating profit, meanwhile, rose 14.2 percent on the year, to ¥94.6 billion ($1.2 billion). Profit for the full fiscal year, however, declined by 2.4 percent to ¥378.1 billion (approximately $4.9 billion), compared with the ¥387.6 billion ($5.1 billion) Canon raked in for all of 2010. Net income, on the other hand, rose by nearly 14 percent over Q4 2010 (¥61.4 billion from ¥54 billion), but only 0.8 percent over the full fiscal year (¥248.6 billion in FY 2011, ¥246.6 billion in FY 2010). Looking forward to 2012, the cameramaker expects net income to increase to ¥250 billion, which would mark the second straight year of less than one percent growth. This forecast is lower than what many analysts expected, though Canon based its projections on assumptions that the yen will continue to rise against both the dollar and the euro, making Japanese exports more expensive in Western markets. It was against this backdrop of disappointment that company president and COO Tsuneji Uchida announced his resignation today, effective March 29th. The 70-year-old Uchida will be replaced by 76-year-old chairman Fujio Mitarai, with Uchida slipping into an advisory role. Coming off a year that saw a devastating tsunami in Japan and supply chain disruptions in flood-ravaged Thailand, Canon underscored its cautious outlook for 2012, in a statement: "The future remains increasingly uncertain amid growing concern over a global economic slowdown." Find Canon's full report at the source link, below.
Samsung 2011 Q4 earnings official: $42 billion in sales, $4.7 billion operating profit
It might not be making as much money as the competition in Cupertino, but that doesn't mean Samsung isn't raking in cash at an astonishing clip. We reported earnings estimates a few weeks ago, but now it's official that the firm posted a 5.3 trillion won ($4.7 billion) operating profit in Q4 2011. That represents over a 2 trillion won ($1.8 billion) increase year over year. In all, it pulled in 47.3 trillion won ($42 billion) in sales, thanks in no small part to the over 300 million phones Sammy sold last year. While mobile accounted for roughly 40 percent of company sales and half of its operating profit (2.6 trillion won, or $2.3 billion), its semiconductor business did almost as well, raking in 2.3 trillion won ($2 billion) in profit over the same period. Samsung's Display Panel business outperformed 2010 -- buoyed by strong sales in LED televisions -- as sales were up almost 20 percent, to 8.55 trillion won ($7.6 billion).Well the call just finished up, and Sammy provided some prognosication for 2012. It anticipates the mobile business to continue to grow, with LTE and and new market segments (read: Galaxy Note) helping drive sales. TV sales are also expected to remain on the uptick, as Samsung anticipates demand to continue growing due in part to the London Olympics and roll-out of more Smart TVs. Feel free to check out all the numbers giving Samsung reason for its optimism at the source link below.
Nokia releases Q4 2011 earnings report: operating profits drop, Lumia sales break one million
Nokia released its latest quarterly earnings report today, following up on a somewhat disappointing Q3 with a similarly bleak Q4. The Finnish manufacturer finished 2011 with a little more than €10 billion ($13.1 billion) in net sales -- 11 percent higher than Q3, but 21 percent lower than 2010, when Nokia raked in about €12.7 billion (approximately $16.7 billion). Operating profit, meanwhile, rose by 90 percent over Q3, but is still down on the year by a whopping 56 percent; this quarter, in fact, saw an operating loss of €954 million (about $1.3 billion). Its net cash and liquid assets also dropped by €1.4 billion over the year, marking a 20 percent decline. The general takeaway, then, is that things are looking better than they were last quarter, but worse than they were last year. To date, the company has sold "well over" one million Lumia devices, but this Windows Phone surge has apparently come at Symbian's expense. "In certain markets, there has been an acceleration of the anticipated trend towards lower-priced smartphones with specifications that are different from Symbian's traditional strengths," CEO Stephen Elop said in a statement. "As a result of the changing market conditions, combined with our increased focus on Lumia, we now believe that we will sell fewer Symbian devices than we previously anticipated." Looking forward, Nokia expects to break even during the first quarter of 2012, due in part to lower than expected seasonal sales and what it calls "competitive industry dynamics." For the full report, check out the source link below.
Nintendo releases quarterly earnings report: 61 percent drop in profit, grim forecast
Nintendo released its latest quarterly earnings report this morning and, as with last quarter's report, there's not a whole lot to celebrate. The company posted profits of ¥40.9 billion (about $631.6 million) for the October - December period, representing a 61 percent quarterly drop. That's especially disappointing, considering that this period has traditionally been strong for Nintendo, which had previously forecast an operating profit of ¥1 billion (around $12.9 million). Those forecasts have since changed, however, with the manufacturer now predicting a ¥45 billion ($580 million) operating loss for the full year, ending March 31st. Nintendo blames the poor showing to sagging 3DS sales, which have forced it to slash prices. Also on Thursday, President Satoru Iwata told reporters that his company plans to release its new Wii U console across the US, Europe Australia and Japan in time for the 2012 year-end holiday season. Read the report in full, at the source link below.
Dish Network to close more Blockbusters than originally anticipated, CEO confirms
Dish Network's curious Blockbuster project appears to be sputtering a bit, now that the company has confirmed that it will shutter more stores than originally anticipated. Speaking to Reuters at CES today, Dish Network CEO Joe Clayton confirmed that his company plans to close all Blockbuster shops that aren't turning a profit, and that some of the remaining stores will be converted into Dish customer service outlets. Back in July, the company announced plans to keep about 1,500 stores open, along with about 90 percent of Blockbuster employees, but those aspirations have since been derailed. "We are committed to keeping the profitable stores open that are generating positive cash flow, but there are ones that aren't going to make it," Clayton explained. "We will close unprofitable stores. We will close additional stores." The exec did not specify how many stores would be closed, nor did he offer any sort of timeline, but spokesman Marc Lumpkin said that the decisions would be made on a "case by case" basis.
'Staunchly British' Jagex sets the record straight about its new ownership
Jagex doesn't take kindly to being called an American company these days, it appears. In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, CEO Mark Gerhard set the record straight about the recently reported deal that put the British game studio under the purview of an American investment firm. Because the deal was made earlier last year, Gerhard sees this as old news and stressed that the company was trucking on much the same as it ever was. "The insinuation that this is a company that somehow now is run by bankers in the US again couldn't be further from the truth," he said. "Sure we therefore have some American shareholders, but the management and the culture and the ethos and everything else is the same people, in the same hands, and staunchly British." He also clarified why the studio's profits were reported to be down: "If you look at our company's house filings, revenues are up but profits are down, and those aren't because we're doing a crap job, that's because we're consciously taking those profits and ploughing them back into the business." Gerhard said that the company was "very, very selective" when it came to investors, and that it feels completely comfortable with the current board of directors. He said that the new investors were not interfering with the day-to-day development and operations of Jagex's ever-expanding library of titles: "I'm very excited for the year ahead and everyone in the studio is very focused on, not just making RuneScape and 8Realms a financial success, but our work on Stellar Dawn and even Transformers coming together to make truly great games for this year."
God save the green: Deal makes Jagex a US company
Jagex is trading up the Union Jack for the Stars and Stripes, as controlling interest in the studio has changed hands to a US firm. Insight Venture Partners, a venture capital firm from the US, completed a deal last year to increase its ownership to 55% of the UK-based company. Previously, the firm had 35% interest in Jagex. Now that the scales have tipped to the new ownership, this technically makes Jagex a US-controlled company and has US investors leading its board of directors. While revenues were up 2% for Jagex in 2011, both operating and net profits were significantly down from the previous financial year. Jagex is a major player in the MMO free-to-play market, with RuneScape, Transformers Universe, and 8Realms as part of its project portfilio. Develop reports that the controlling interest was made possible by Jagex co-founder Andrew Gower selling off his ownership claims to the firm for $115.65 million. As part of the deal, Jagex paid $3.85 million in expenses. The studio will remain in Cambridge while its controlling firm is in NYC.
Star Wars: The Old Republic hits a million players, 28 million hours played
EA has announced that Star Wars: The Old Republic has assembled more than a million registered players in its first week officially live, earning it the self-granted title of "fastest growing subscription MMO in history." A million players is a solid milestone, but EA and BioWare still have some parsecs to travel to make SW:TOR a resounding success: The beta test, don't forget, was able to pick up twice as many players than are currently registered. EA's management expects at least two million players to call the game successful at all, according to previous reports. EA says that players have logged in more than 28 million game hours (no word on how many hours spent waiting in login queues, of course), and in that time have created 3.8 million characters, split about evenly across Jedi and Sith. More than 2 billion NPCs have been killed in the eight days since launch as well, which is quite the virtual genocide. You can check out the official stats and announcement below.
Tiny Speck and Trion Worlds make gaming headlines in 2011
Trion Worlds and Tiny Speck are two MMO studios that have made waves in 2011 with their ambitious plans and potential profit margins, according to the Wall Street Journal. The publication's article examines how these companies are running contrary to Zynga's model by producing top-tier content without trying to nickle-and-dime customers. Trion's story is seen as one of high risk and higher rewards, especially considering that it was bringing in no revenue before last March while developing three titles. "RIFT has had tremendous success -- the commercial results are just astounding -- but we've got two more big games coming... There is no joy in Mudville," said Trion's David Reid. The article notes that once a MMO breaks even, the profit margin can be as high as 70%. Trion is reportedly adding 100 new people to the team in the first part of 2012, which will put this studio in giant-sized territory: 520 employees in total. Tiny Speck may not be as large, with just 41 employees, but the team is growing due to Glitch's success. Even though the potential to make money is there, co-founder Eric Costello says that the team puts in long hours as primarily a labor of love: "The game industry is famous for running their employees into the ground, and we definitely don't want to do that, but we've also found that building a game is a lot harder than we thought it would be."
'Little risk of failure': Analysts predict SWTOR will turn a healthy profit
Worried that Bobby Kotick has the right of things and that Star Wars: The Old Republic won't make bank for Electronic Arts? Market analyst Michael Pachter disagrees, saying that he not only predicts that EA will cover the costs of SWTOR's development, but come out just fine even with LucasArts taking its share. Pachter says that LucasArts will claim 35% of SWTOR's revenue: "The revenue split is around 35 percent to LucasArts after EA earns back their investment. That means EA keeps most of the revenue from disc sales (they have marketing expenses and need to staff up the server farms), so they should earn a nice profit there. Keep in mind that EA expensed the development cost when incurred, so much of the disc sales revenue will be profit." Pachter's predictions for the title are sizable yet reasonable; he thinks that SWTOR will get 1.5 million subscribers. This translates to $270 million per year in revenue, $80 million of which will be pure profit for EA after LucasArts and operating costs take their share. Even if SWTOR only draws in -- or sustains -- merely 500,000 subscribers, Pachter says the game will be sitting pretty. Other market analysts, such as EEDAR VP Jesse Divnich, support the notion of SWTOR's profitability. "Based upon user commentary and consumer surveys, the profit potential for The Old Republic is high. We see little risk of failure for The Old Republic," Divnich stated.
Motorola Mobility stockholders happy with Google merger, 9 out of 10 dentists agree
The people have spoken, and they're pleased. Said people, of course, are Motorola Mobility's shareholders, who have given a seal of overwhelming approval to the company's merger with Google. The company confirmed this sentiment in a statement issued yesterday, declaring that a full 99 percent of shareholders gave a thumbs up to Big G's acquisition at a recent meeting that comprised 74 percent of all outstanding shares. It's likely that much of this optimism was fueled by a rosier Q3 earnings report (not to mention the relatively favorable conditions upon which the acquisition was determined), but Googorola isn't entirely out of the woods, as the federal government must still give the deal its final approval. Motorola Mobility says that should happen by early next year, though it acknowledges the potential for delay. Read the full statement, after the break.
