Tag: mobile games Page 16 of 17

Ubisoft sells Gameloft stake

On 18/07/2007

Console game publisher Ubisoft sold its 18.89% stake in leading mobile game publisher Gameloft for € 81.27m (c. $111m) to Calyon, the investment banking unit of French bank Credit Agricole.

The deal is interestingly crafted and seems to have been driven by financial performance concerns for Ubisoft: it is an equity swap agreement that gives Calyon 24 months to sell the Gameloft shares on the market. Any changes in the Gameloft share price will then be recorded by Ubisoft, so the deal will only affect Ubisoft’s income statement when Calyon sells the Gameloft shares. “Ubisoft said the equity swap enables it to stagger the placement of the Gameloft shares so that Ubisoft can keep benefiting from the company’s development potential over the next two years.”

No need to get all hyped up though: the Ubisoft brands will remain safely where they are: The two companies said (other sources said “hinted”) that they will continue to collaborate, especially when it comes to utilizing Ubisoft’s brands on mobile phones.

The fact that the license ties and collaboration will remain, that it will still be the Guillemot brothers at the helm of both companies and, last but not least, the way the deal mechanics work would suggest that this was more a piece of corporate and financial housekeeping for Ubisoft rather than an aggressive new move for Gameloft. On the other hand, even mighty Gameloft may have felt the need to position itself slightly more independently in order to be able to move in a market that has seen continuous consolidation waves and aggressively pushing market players.

Cellcom's ad-funded game trial: the Results

By Volker

On 18/07/2007

In Games

It is probably because they read here my criticism of their somewhat cryptic information policy back in April (well they probably didn’t) but – one way or another – Cellcom, the Israeli carrier that entered into a comprehensive ad-funded mobile game trial has provided insight in the results. Kudos!

So what do we learn? Here’s some of the highlights:
* 44% click-through rate
* 19% acquisition rate
* 10x higher game downloads per user (compared to downloads prior to the trial)
* 24% of the participants had not downloaded a game in the preceding 6 months, and 54% had not done so in the preceding 3 months.
* Take-up appears to have been particularly high amongst the youngest (9-20 years). No surprise here. The sentence reporting that is a bit mumbled, so not sure if they want to tell us that 65% of the users in this segment downloaded at least one game during the trial…

A little aside I noticed was that they call advertisers – somewhat carefully – sponsors: does that mean they didn’t get any return for their money? Anyway, they advertisers/sponsors included quite a few of the biggies, e.g. Nokia, McDonalds, Diadora, Samsung, Adidas and Walt Disney. All the agency powerhouses tinkered with it, too, with McCann, Saatchi & Saatchi and BBDO all involved.

I have praised above Cellcom’s information policy but two crucial data points are (somewhat unsurprisingly) left out, namely CPM and pay-out to the game publishers. For a 1-month trial, everyone will be in for the ride, and be only to show that they are in the midst of the flavour of the month, mobile advertising. However, only if advertisers are that (and not sponsors), i.e. if CPM will be at levels comparable to other media (or better), will it work. The above click-through numbers suggest that this might well be the case, and the added value of extreme targeting (the mobile screen is a user’s most personal one: it is not shared with others to the extent the TV or computer is) will improve that further.

The question will then remain if big mobile game publishers who regularly spend hundreds of thousands dollars on a game will provide for in-game ads in these games and if licensors for such games will allow advertising that will then factually be endorsed by their brands. Finally, operators must make sure that the consumer is not charged for the data transferred to feed the ads. This can make for an incredibly complex business model, and perhaps one that will not make it worthwhile for one or more of the parties in it to participate. Much easier of course if there is no third-party licensor involved. The result could then likely be a two-fold structure: high-powered branded premium games for a price and unbranded, ad-funded games for free.

EA times 4

By Volker

On 19/06/2007

In Games

Gaming behemoth Electronic Arts announced it would be splitting the company into 4, namely EA Games, EA Sports, EA Sims and EA Casual. The first two cater for the classic console and specific sports properties respectively and – rather remarkably – the 3rd creates a whole division for one single property, namely the ludicrously successful Sims. It would seem that this is a sign for more to come, that is after Sims packs some of which 3rd party-sponsored/endorsed/branded. So we are probably here to see the first moves towards an MMO, an online community, etc, etc.

EA Mobile will become part of EA Casual (this piece had been announced a few days earlier). Reuters interestingly speaks of casual games as “games, which are usually played online or on mobile phones, are a small but rapidly growing part of the industry.” So now mobile games are already part of the “usual” – great news!

EA Mobile will surely continue to serve as the mobile extension for EA’s other divisions’ properties and licenses, such as Tiger Woods, FIFA, Need for Speed, Madden NFL etc. The division’s new President, Kathy Vrabeck formerly of Activision, at least mentioned something along those lines, so no big news here.

Oberon plays mobile with I-Play

By Volker

On 31/05/2007

In Deals, Games

Finally… I-Play and Oberon today announced that the former would be acquired by the latter, allegedly for $110-120m. A deal involving I-Play had been rumoured to happen for quite some time, so good for Gosen and his team that they found a suitor. And not a bad one either: Oberon is an online gaming powerhouse, so a move across to mobile makes sense (and they had probably realised that their acquisition of Blaze (which itself was the combination of Synergenix and Kayak Interactive) last year wasn’t getting them anywhere close to where they need to be). I-Play with its CEO David Gosen certainly showed stamina. They published some pretty cool titles (including Gamevil’s critically acclaimed “Skipping Stone” and hit series “The Fast & The Furious”) and in spite of oft rumoured shortage of cash just hung in there.

Oberon also raised some fresh money from investors Goldman Sachs, Oak Investments and Lehman Brothers, so all looks good for them, I suppose.

UPDATE: Today (12 Sept 2007) I-Play announced 11 new games all drawn from Oberon’s back catalogue. They are Hexic and Mozaki Blocks (apparently from the creator of Tetris), Flowerz, Slinky, Fish Tycoon, Spin & Win, Bricks of Egypt, Bricks of Atlantis, Magic Match, Bubble Town and Saints & Sinners Bingo. It will be interesting to see what will win in the current battle of big brands and casual games; both are frequently cited as two of the key components of breaking into the mass market.

Games shine on Orange

By Volker

On 16/05/2007

In Games

Mobile games outsell other types of content, including ringtones and wallpapers on Orange UK, we read. Orange published its first digital media index which also showed that Orange customers send 872m text messages a month, with most sent between 4pm and 8pm as people plan a night out.

In Q1/2007, almost 750,000 games were downloaded. This compares to only 65,000 and 250,000 tracks, ringtones and music video. This is rather noteworthy. So why is it?

Games are the only category of the above that is tied to the commercial ecosphere of today (be it via carrier deck or from a D2C portal, etc): I can download a picture from the web and bluetooth it or sideload it to my phone and it will work. Phones understand jpeg. I can do the same with a music track. Phones understand mp3. I cannot do the same with a Java game. Phones do understand Java but it is an executable, so you need an installer file, etc. Higher complexity. Too complicated to do it for me, buy it then…

Games have an additional particularity and that is that they need to be thoroughly adapted to the small screen. A song sounds the same (assuming you have a good pair of headphones), a picture will be, well, smaller on a small screen but otherwise undistorted. A game requires interaction, and this is being done very differently on a phone. So we may well see the above numbers drifting further apart…

Who's Europe's #2 in games?

By Volker

On 11/05/2007

In Games

Who is Europe’s second largest mobile games provider? EA, Gameloft, Glu, Hands-On, Namco, I-Play, THQ? Nah – it is Zenops! Who? Yes, you heard right… That is, at least as per the lead investor in Zenops, who rather boldly stated this in their announcement of the acquisition of formerly high-aiming and recently rather ailing In-Fusio (including Mobile Scope) and niche player Filao.

Now, the acquisitions suggest that Zenops aims towards i-mode: this is where it was active in the past, and where Filao has expertise. It probably aims to apply Mobils Scope’s and In-Fusio’s expertise to expand this onto other platforms. But #2? Come on!

The statement is all too bold, and it gives the whole thing a bit of a stale taste. Do never pretend things you cannot be. To aim for such positions is an honourable and worthy task. To simply assert it without any hint as to where this should be derived from or on what it is based is, well, best left uncommented, in particular if it comes with such humbling clarifications: Zenops’ website currently (11 May 2007) says under the download tab: “For non i-mode user, games from ZENOPS will be available in a few months”. It gets worse: ex-In-Fusio man Florent Pitoun writes that his “old company has been sold to a small industry player at a really ridculous value, meaning that my shares are now worth nothing.” Ouch!

So, dear folks from Zenops-In-Fusio-Mobile-Scope-Filao: send your investor chap to a course in media training and good luck to you all!

It is NOT (only) the kids playing mobile games

By Volker

On 25/04/2007

In Games

Here‘s some always again interesting finds on mobile game demographics re-confirmed :

29% of all 25-34 year-old US-Americans downloaded mobile games in 2006, and 27% of the 18-24 year-olds but only 15% of 13-17 year-olds. The older folks also play more: 50% of the two older age groups vs 41% of the teens play mobile games on a daily basis.

The picture is naturally somewhat distorted as proportionately more adults own mobile phones than teens (although the latter catch up quickly).

However, considering that, in the UK, the average credit kids have on their pre-paid phones (which most of them have) is a meagre £5, which leaves little to no wiggling space when compared to game prices of £3-5 per pop: they simply don’t have the dough to buy more.

Another re-confirmed suspicion highlights the distribution challenge: 29 million US-Americans play mobile games, only 7 million download them, and that means 22 million play whatever is on their handset – whether it is a good or a bad one. 22 million gamers that do not access all the great games that are out there show that there is a severe disconnect regarding a) discovery and b) marketing and distribution in general. Whilst these will not be the only factors, they are significant.