Capcom 2013 financials see $940m in revenue, several console titles fall below sales target
Capcom has published its full-year financials for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2013. While the company's revenue climbed, several games have failed to meet sales targets, and efforts to increase the company's digital returns have proved largely fruitless.
GI.biz reports that Capcom's revenue rose year-on-year from ¥82 billion ($820 million) to ¥94 billion ($940 million).
However, Capcom's Digital Contents business, which encompasses console, PC and mobile titles, saw profits tumble by over 50% at $31 million. This is significant, considering this arm of the company accounts for 67.7% of the group's total income. Aside from 2010, this is the company's worst performance since 2005.
Software sales totalled 14 million units for the year, and only three of Capcom's releases achieved over 1 million in sales. Controversial release DmC: Devil May Cry saw sales of 1.15 million worldwide against an expected 2 million units, while Resident Evil 6 sold 4.9 million units, falling short of a targeted 7 million units. Dragon's Dogma proved a surprise hit on consoles with 1.3 million units sold.
Capcom now projects that revenue will remain static for the next fiscal year, but added that it expects less profit and software sales at 13 million units worldwide. The company's current release sate includes Lost Planet 3, Dead Rising 3 and Monster Hunter 4. The latter seems likely to achieve its targeted 2.8 million sales figure by the end of March 2014.
Also, Resident Evil: Revelations should hit its 1.2 million sales target, although Lost Planet 3 - which also needs 1.2 million sales - seems like it'll be well wide of the mark after a poor launch in all territories.
However, the company's online games division has fared well, with a 45.9% revenue jump to ¥22.9 billion ($229 million). Capcom expects a further increase of 22.3% by March 2014, bringing that figure to ¥28 billion.
The report suggests that the transition between console generations has caused its packaged figures to stagnate, and GI.biz adds that - at present - Capcom has $152 million in cash, and points out that this isn't a lot of money for a company seeking to gain a solid foothold in the next generation. Part of Capcom's plan is to reel back outsourced projects and hire 100 new staff across its PC, digital and mobile divisions. The company also aims to offer more DLC moving forward.
On the DLC issue, Capcom COO Haruhiro Tsujimoto said in a statement, "I regret to say that, up to now, we had few plans for the full-scale implementation of DLC. From here on out, we need to focus on the long-term provision of content starting at the earliest stages of development.
"Furthermore, in terms of user response, if the additional related content we are providing continually to users online is deemed uninteresting from the start, there will be no ongoing business to pursue. This means that, more than ever before, the creation of underlying content is the key to success."
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