The first quarter of fiscal year 2020, which began in April 2019 and ended in June 2019, has come and gone. As such, details about company earnings and other statistics are emerging. One bit of relevant news concerns Ubisoft’s earnings for the first quarter and how things have changed with regards to platform profitability. Apparently, FY2020’s first quarter didn’t see the PlayStation 4 continue its reign as Ubisoft’s most profitable platform. That honor instead went to PCs.
According to VG247, Ubisoft’s earnings for this fiscal year, thus far, are evidence of massive growth in its PC business. The French publisher earned a whopping €314.2 million, which translates to roughly $352 million USD. Of this number, PC platforms generated 34 percent of the company’s profit. Meanwhile, the PS4 counted for 31 percent of profits, with the Xbox One falling behind at 18 percent.
This is a steep increase for PC, compared to Ubisoft’s earnings for the first quarter of FY2019. For the period between April 2018 and June 2018, PS4 generated 38 percent of the publisher’s earnings. PC came in second at 24 percent, meaning Ubisoft has experienced quite the shift in platform profitability year-over-year. Apparently, much of this growth can be attributed to Anno 1800, a city building real-time strategy title for PC that launched this past April.
Since game sales on PC didn’t overtake PS4 sales by too wide of a margin, the Sony console still managed to generate good profitability for Ubisoft. It’s especially surprising when considering no games of note have launched in this quarter of the 2020 fiscal year. However, the likes of The Division 2 and Assassin’s Creed III Remastered, both of which arrive in March 2019, were probably of great help. The same is likely true of Far Cry New Dawn’s and Trials Rising releases in February.
Ubisoft’s next big releases won’t launch until this fall. Ghost Recon: Breakpoint will come to the PS4, PC, and Xbox One on October 4th. Just Dance 2020 is slated for a November 5th release on the PS4, Switch, Wii, and Xbox One.
[Source: Ubisoft via VG247]
