Activision Blizzard has been going backward for the last 12 months. This article is going to be taking a closer look at what happened and why and will identify the cause of their losses. Activision Blizzard lost over 60 million
I love a good round of Overwatch. And if you’re like me, then you probably recently heard the news about Activision Blizzard having to write down $157 million from the mobile version of its hit game. Why is this significant? It’s significant because their loss was caused by a metric that I used to get excited about in school…
Activision Blizzard lost over 60 million users in the last year, but the company still ranks as one of the largest game developers in the world.
Activision Blizzard lost more than 60 million monthly active users (MAUs) across its suite of titles during the first quarter of 2019, according to new data from SuperData Research. This marks a steep drop compared to last year’s Q1 figures, which showed that Activision Blizzard had more than 105 million MAUs across its titles.
SuperData also noted that this is not only because of a decline in core gamers but also due to the absence of major releases from Blizzard or Activision. The company has been focusing on mobile games and esports instead, which contributed to its revenue growth in Q1 2019 despite losing players from traditional AAA titles such as Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 and StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void.
While it’s true that Activision Blizzard has seen a drop in MAUs, it remains one of the biggest video game companies in the world by revenue generation. For example, SuperData Research estimates that Activision Blizzard earned $624 million in Q1 2019 alone — an amount that is greater than all other publishers combined except for Tencent, who brought in $650 million during that same period
The video game industry has seen a massive decline in sales over the past few years, and Activision Blizzard is feeling the pain. The gaming giant announced in its latest financial report that it lost $63 million in the first quarter of 2019, compared to $1 billion in revenue for the same period last year.
Activision’s stock fell more than 10 percent after it released its quarterly earnings report on Wednesday, which was its worst day since 2011. Its overall revenue was down 15 percent compared to last year, and its subscriber base has fallen by more than half since 2015.
Activision’s most popular games include Call of Duty, Overwatch, and World of Warcraft (which is no longer subscription-based). But even though these titles are some of the most recognizable names in gaming history, they’re not performing as well as they used to — especially compared with newer releases like Fortnite and Apex Legends.