January 28, 2011

IHS Screen Digest assesses and forecasts C4Q 2010 sales and financial performance for a select group of leading third-party games publishers in the most important sales period of the year for the games industry.

IHS Screen Digest assesses and forecasts C4Q 2010 sales and financial performance for a select group of leading third-party games publishers in the most important sales period of the year for the games industry. Key games sales forecasts and publisher revenue splits into packaged retail, digital, online and mobile are included.

The publishers examined in this Market Monitor are Activision Blizzard, Electronic Arts, THQ and Ubisoft.

Highlights:

1. Activision Blizzard is ahead of the game in diversifying its revenue away from packaged retail and into digital distribution and online gaming: we expect non-packaged retail to account for 19 per cent of C4Q revenue, nearly double what we expect Electronic Arts to generate from non-packaged retail at 9 per cent of revenue.
2. IHS Screen Digest believes EA is on course to beat its target of $750m in digital, online and mobile revenues by the end of March 2011. EA is driving growth across numerous digital and online segments: DLC for PC and console and full games sales are growing fast and, along with social via Playfish, are generating the lion's share of growth in digital and online.
3. THQ and Ubisoft continue to rely on packaged games: we expect THQ to generate 6 per cent of C4Q revenues from non-packaged games while Ubisoft is likely to generate an even lower proportion. Strong performances at physical retail and healthy release slates for 2011 are encouraging but the lack of diversification from a packaged games market in long term decline remains a concern.

In this report:

1. 2010 C4Q Top Line Publisher Forecasts
2. 2010 C4Q key packaged games sales forecasts
3. Publisher digital transition indicators
4. Revenue shares within third party publisher basket
5. Activision Blizzard C4Q 2010 revenue forecast
6. Activision Blizzard revenue splits and key title forecasts
7. Electronic Arts C4Q 2010 revenue forecast
8. Electronic Arts revenue splits and key title forecasts
9. THQ C4Q 2010 revenue forecast
10. THQ revenue splits and key title forecasts
11. Ubisoft C4Q 2010 revenue forecast
12. Ubisoft revenue splits and key title forecasts

Tables and charts included:

• All publishers: Quarterly non-GAAP revenue forecasts $m
• All publishers: Quarterly Packaged Games revenue $m
• All publishers: Quarterly Digital and Online revenue $m
• All publishers: Quarterly Mobile revenue $m
• All publishers: Online, digital revenue share of C4Q revenues by publisher %
• All publishers: Quarterly non-GAAP revenue share in publisher group %
• All publishers: Quarterly packaged games revenue share in publisher group %
• All publishers: Quarterly digital and online revenue share in publisher group %
• All publishers: Quarterly mobile games revenue share in publisher group %
• Activision Blizzard: C4Q non-GAAP revenue year-on-year % change
• Activision Blizzard: Quarterly historical and forecast revenue $m
• Activision Blizzard: Key releases in the quarter forecasts
• Activision Blizzard: C4Q Revenue Split (packaged games, online and digital, mobile)
• EA: C4Q non-GAAP revenue year-on-year % change
• EA: Quarterly historical and forecast revenue $m
• EA: Key releases in the quarter forecasts
• EA: C4Q Revenue Split (packaged games, online and digital, mobile)
• EA: Quarterly digital , online and mobile revenue $m
• THQ: C4Q non-GAAP revenue year-on-year % change
• THQ: Quarterly historical and forecast revenue $m
• THQ: Key releases in the quarter forecasts
• THQ: C4Q Revenue Split (packaged games, online and digital, mobile)
• Ubisoft: C4Q non-GAAP revenue year-on-year % change
• Ubisoft: Quarterly historical and forecast revenue $m
• Ubisoft: Key releases in the quarter forecasts
• Ubisoft: C4Q Revenue Split (packaged games, online and digital, mobile)

Pages: 13

Tables & charts: 26

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