Ubisoft reports £26m loss before major games hit

Ubisoft has posted a net loss £26m for the first half of the fiscal year ending September 30th but remains confident on a strong second half.

In its latest financial report, the publisher noted that operating loss was down from almost £30m in the same period last year.

Sales for the publisher reached £224million, up 12.1 per cent on the previous year.

Ubisoft put half of its overall sales down to Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Future Soldier, back catalog games, which fell by nine per cent to £78m, and online revenues. The publisher’s online portfolio reported a 59 per cent jump in revenue to £22 million.

The other half of sales for the period were put down to the initial sell-in of Just Dance 4.

Gross profit was also up £27.5m from the first half of the previous year to £154.5m.

Despite posting an overall loss for the first six months of 2012-13, Ubisoft is confident that sales of the recently released Assassin’s Creed 3, which has already sold an estimated 3.5 million copies, as well as Far Cry 3, ZombiU and Rayman Legends will lead to a successful second half.

The company has revised upwards its full-year 2012-13 target for sales to between £962 million and £1billion.

"From a longer-term perspective, WiiU’s progression and the arrival of the next generation of consoles, combined with the strong momentum in the free-to-play model for PC, mobile and tablet games, will enable us to capitalise on the investments we have made in recent years,” said Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot.

“These developments will cement Ubisoft’s positioning as a creator of successful brands with a growing expertise in new online models and services."