14 DAY TRIAL // Ubisoft has put out financial data showing that the French-based publisher has seen a fall of 51% in sales, missing its proposed targets by 12%. The company only managed to sell 113.71 million dollars worth of games in the first quarter of the fiscal year, which ended on June 30.
The overall poor state of the videogaming markets all over the world, as shown by the recent NPD Group data, has been cited as being one of the major causes for the disappointing performance.
Ubisoft has reduced its prospects for the second quarter, saying that it only plans to release a few casual titles, the movie-based Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs and a new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game for Nintendo Wii and PlayStation 2. The company expects to get sales of about 100 million, which is a fall of approximately 50% over 2008. Ubisoft is planning to bounce back in the third quarter, as Assassin's Creed 2 is set to debut to strong sales.
Yves Guillemot has blamed part of the poor performance on piracy, which has affected the sales of its titles on the Nintendo DS and on the PC. Apparently, Ubisoft is getting ready to introduce some measures that will curb the phenomenon. The publisher has also announced that titles like Splinter Cell Conviction and Red Steel 2 will be delayed to the first months of 2010, which will limit the amount of money it will be making this year.
Guillemot stated that “We are disappointed that we have to postpone the release of several major games but we consider that this choice is the best one in the long-term interests of Ubisoft. The excellent response to our games at E3, as well as the high buzz generated for titles such as Assassin's Creed 2, Splinter Cell Conviction and Avatar, reinforce our belief that the company can achieve strong growth in the second half of the fiscal year.”