Activision Reports Strong Second Fiscal Quarter
Activision Blizzard, the entity that includes both Activision Publishing and Blizzard, announced its financial results for its fiscal quarter ended June 30, 2001. The company reported a strong quarter, although even the financial statements make it look unlikely that Diablo III will be released in 2011. Read on for the numbers and other details...
Importantly, in the quarter, "Subscription, licensing and other revenues" were $378 million (33%) of revenues. The biggest contributor to that category is World of Warcraft. World of Warcraft continues to be a significant part of Activision Blizzard's total business, and that number is up from $324 million (34%) in the same quarter the previous year. This is a slightly different method of presenting World of Warcraft's contribution designed to slightly disguise its influence on the company, but don't underestimate its importance. According to Chief Executive Officer Robert Kotick, "Our better-than-expected second-quarter performance was driven by record digital sales of our online-enabled franchises."
Broken down another way, Blizzard's contribution to revenues (including games such as StarCraft II) was $313 million in this quarter, compared to $299 million in the same quarter the previous year. That gives you an idea of how much of said revenues are coming from Blizzard's products.
While Activision Blizzard is raising its financial estimates for calendar year 2011 performance, those estimates do "...not include a new game from Blizzard in 2011" In other words, no matter what you hear from PR folks, the accountants at Activision Blizzard aren't planning on seeing Diablo III this year.
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