EA Mobile Has Largest U.S. Marketshare In Q2; Puzzle Games Still Most Popular: Report
The latest mobile games report from Nielsen Mobile shows in startling detail how hard it is to make money in this business. Of the 141 publishers tracked, shockingly few—only 55—made money through U.S. carrier partnerships in the second quarter. Even more striking, a majority of revenues—62 percent—are made by the top five publishers, which is up from 60 percent only a year ago. The private report, released to game publishers this week, was also shared with us. That suggests the 86 companies that did not bill any revenue through U.S. carriers during the quarter made money by selling games direct to the consumer, however, it couldn’t be that promising since most content is still distributed through the carrier. Of course, there’s also international sales, which were not included in this data. Nielsen Mobile said the numbers change when including off-deck, but not substantially.
Top five mobile games publishers in Q2:
Top five mobile game categories in Q2 (market share):
Posted In: Entertainment, Gaming, Research & Metrics, Companies, Electronic Arts , EAMobile, Hands-On
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Comments (2)
Aug 8, 2008 3:49 AM
The big publishers dominate the carrier games decks. Therefore, consumers ONLY see those games on the deck.
It’s a totally closed shop. The Publishers don’t have to spend a penny on customer acquisition. Almost a corrupt model.
Once consumers browse the mobile internet at large things will even out more.
This is like having games featured on AOL back in the early 90s. For small players, whose sales team have lesser expense accounts, it would have been just as hard to make revenue.
Search outside the walled garden changed all that. The US is still way behind Europe in this regard, since the operators are not willing to enable on-phone billing for 3rd parties. The stats in Europe would be far less skewed in favour of the bigger publishers.
Aug 8, 2008 7:13 PM
Funny how everybody blames it on expense accounts… Remember that Sorrent (GLU), Jamdat (EA) and Gameloft where all small once too. They are just working hard while everyone else is complaining.
And yes, check those stats. It is still the same publishers because they take the time and effort to make it happen.