EA makes a lot of money on the PSP
by Andrew Yoon 
{ Aug 3rd 2006 at 12:57AM }
While it's easy to hate EA, they are still one of the most influential companies in the industry. Their fiscal numbers for 2006 and Q1 2007 were released a few days ago and they reveal interesting information. It's unsurprising that EA makes a lot of money of the PSP: it made $289 million in revenue on PSP sales last year. What is surprising is how much more money that is compared to the Nintendo DS: only $67 million in the same time. Even more surprising is that although EA makes a lot more revenue on the PSP, it has announced much greater support for the DS in the future.[Via PSPWorld]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
The Insomniac @ Aug 3rd 2006 1:38AM
I think there's a simple explanation for this. EA makes games that have more appeal to the PSP crowd. the DS seems to fill a more niche audience in terms of games and genres, and EA is the powerhouse releasing the mainstream and "safe" games...
Just my opinion.
Mark @ Aug 3rd 2006 1:51AM
Dude, you have to be kidding me.
There is a significant difference between REVENUE and PROFIT. Why more support for the DS? Because it is probably cheaper to develop and produce DS games, not to mention they sell for 3/5th the price, so will bring in 3/5th the revenue even if sales were equal.
Brian @ Aug 3rd 2006 11:45AM
I'll tell you why they make so little from the DS... because every game EA has released for the DS sucks! EA hasn't figured that system out at all. Their titles (well the only one I have is NCAA 07) for the PSP are of much better quality. But seriously, Madden DS... Terrible! GoldenEye Rogue Agent, meh ok, but certainly not great. Sims 2, sucks, Need for Speed Underground... worst game I have ever played. And so on and so on...
But hey, I sure do enjoy NCAA on my PSP (sole reason I bought a PSP, and I'm not dissappointed
pixelator @ Aug 3rd 2006 11:48AM
Damn, everyone's an armchair developer, anymore.
EA is slow. They're only now turning more attention to the DS because the DS didn't make that great of a showing against the PSP after March of 2004 until fairly recently.
Profit comes from revenue. PSP games take more man hours to develop (everything else being equal), but if you sell that many more titles at the inflated amount EA does for their ju... Er, sports titles, then you can recoup that extra expenditure pretty easily.
Insom is on the right track. EAs sports / street-sports games sell better here than a 2D side-scroller Japanese RPG. Whether that's their marketing prowess or dumb luck because they have so many sports games stacked up to port over is anyone's guess. Also, the EA name on games can still sell units, regardless of the slamming they get online.
Like it or not, EA is sort of like the US version of Nintendo of Japan (in terms of software). They have a long history here, known characters, franchises, etc. -- It's no wonder they sell their buggy cra... er, games even at premium prices.
(of course, Burnout Legends was great, but you can thank Criterion for that)
Jason @ Aug 3rd 2006 9:32PM
Let's also try a little simple math.... There are 4 quarters in a year not five. So they had revenue of $256 million vs. $63 million for the DS.
Also look at the SKU table for # of titles produced. For the 5 quarters shown, the produced 18 psp games vs. 18 for the DS and GBA combined.