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Ubisoft Sales Fall Almost 20 Percent
Ubisoft has released their full financial results for the 2009-2010 fiscal year, and the news isn't outstanding for the French publisher.
Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot addressed the dismal results, pointing to the global economic crisis and the overall drop in video game sales around the world, but noting that "Ubisoft's sales were hit particularly hard." The company's total sales dropped 18 percent over the year, although Guillemot mentions that things stabilized a bit in the second half of the year and put them about on par with the same period in the previous fiscal year.
All of the difficulty this year added up to a €60 million operating loss ($84.6 million, according to Ubisoft's conversion rate). Despite the overall loss, fourth quarter sales were actually up 2 percent over the previous year. Ubisoft says this is due to strong sales of Just Dance, Avatar, and Red Steel 2, as well as continuing sales for Assassin's Creed II.
Guillemot expects the strong Q4 performance to continue into the 2010-2011 fiscal year, forecasting "a return to profitable growth." This should be aided by recent releases like Splinter Cell: Conviction and Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands, as well as Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood in November.
Guillemot also points to "the upcoming launches of new consoles, such as Project Natal and Sony Move," as something that will help drive sales for their games. I'm not sure those technically count as new consoles, but I hope Guillemot is right about them helping out.
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