Record Revenues For EA News

Electronic Arts has today released its financial details for the third quarter of the 2007/08 fiscal year, which has seen the publishing giant acquire VG Holdings (Bioware/Pandemic Studios) and launch the likes of Rock Band, Orange Box, and the latest instalment in the Need for Speed franchise.

Despite recording the highest quarterly revenues in the company's history of $1.50 billion (£752.7 million), EA's net income dropped year-on-year from $160 million (£80.3 million) to a net loss of $33 million (£16.6 million) - though the $810 million of Bioware/Pandemic Studios obviously would have made a dent.

EA has also revealed that 5.5 million copies of Need for Speed ProStreet were sold during the quarter, together with an additional 4.5 million copies of FIFA 08 and 4 million copies of The Simpsons Game. The EA Partners sector of the publisher also met with success thanks to Rock Band, which sold 1.5 million copies in the United States, along with acclaim for The Orange Box with Valve Software.

News of the quarterly results comes as EA announced further delays to Mercenaries 2: World in Flames and Battlefield: Bad Company.

"This was a record revenue quarter for EA and the single biggest revenue quarter for any third party publisher in our industry," said John Riccitiello, Chief Executive Officer. "While we are disappointed that two titles slipped out of the March quarter, Burnout Paradise is off to a terrific start and we are looking forward to the upcoming launches of Army of Two and FIFA Street 3."

"Our holiday quarter was solid, with non-GAAP earnings up 43 percent," said Warren Jenson, Chief Financial and Administrative Officer. "For fiscal 2008, we tightened our top-line range toward the high end of our previous guidance, but given that two high-margin titles are now shipping in fiscal 2009, we tightened our bottom-line range toward the lower end of our previous guidance."