Grand Theft Auto 5: 29m sales spur soaring financials for its publisher Grand Theft Auto 5 sold 11m copies in its first 24 hours, and became the fastest entertainment property to gross $1bn (£626m), passing that milestone in three days. Now the games publisher, Take-Two Interactive, says it has sold 29m copies of GTA 5 in to retailers, exceeding the total sell-in figure for its predecessor Grant Theft Auto 4 less than six weeks after launching. The company revealed the figure during its latest quarterly financial results, where it reported net revenues of $1.27bn for its fiscal Q2 2014, which ended on 30 September. Take-Twos profit for the quarter was $325.6m. As a guide to how important the GTA franchise is for the publisher, in the same quarter a year ago, it posted revenues of $288m and a net profit of $10.2m. In its earnings call with analysts after the results were announced, Take-Twos chairman and chief executive officer Strauss Zelnick said the decision to release GTA 5 for current-generation consoles rather than wait for the launch of PlayStation 4 and Xbox One was crucial. I think the release window for GTA V was phenomenal. There was an enormous installed base, massive anticipation and virtually no significant competitive releases, he said. I was questioned an awful lot, you may recall, about the timing of that release. And I think [developer] Rockstar made a great decision in putting it out when they did, and really optimised the intersection of what a great game can do and what an audience wanted and when they wanted it. Zelnick declined to say how many of the 29m copies sold to retailers have already been sold on to gamers, but noted that retailers have been very tight on inventory as they near the launch of the new consoles, implying that a large proportion has been sold through. Its not as though consumer say the next-gen is coming, so I have to buy this title and then Im never going to buy it again, said Zelnick. Its not how they operate. This is a reflection of our finest hopes coming true, which was the intersection of a massive installed base with a massively popular title. Take-Two also talked about its growing digital business during the call, telling analysts that its digital revenues grew 85% year on year to $105.5m, with GTA 5 and downloadable content for Borderlands 2, Civilization 5 and BioShock Infinite all playing a role. The company is also preparing for the launch of the next-generation consoles, saying that it currently has more than 10 unique titles in development, including several games that will be released in its fiscal 2015 – between April 2014 and March 2015.
Posted on: Wed, 30 Oct 2013 09:30:49 +0000
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