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EA’s Ultimate Teams All Saw Year-Over-Year Revenue Growth
During the company’s second quarter financial call, EA chief financial officer Blake Jorgensen stated that the company’s sports title Ultimate Team modes brought in more revenue than the same period last year. Ultimate Team is an enormous driver of in-game purchases in full retail sports titles like Madden 25, FIFA 14, and NHL 14.
EA states that some of this revenue has been offset by the sunsetting of Sims Social and SimCity Social. Additionally, the publisher’s Japanese FIFA Online business took a hit as those gamers are switching over to iOS and Android native apps. Additionally, all of the sports titles, except for FIFA, have sold fewer units than last year.
Additionally, EA reports that full-game downloads are up in second quarter. Jorgensen specifically mentioned PC titles, including SimCity. SimCity’s first quarter sales were deferred to this quarter, despite being nearly a month’s worth.
Our Take
EA has been moving its finances around a bit, changing the way it’s reported non-GAAP revenue. The company has elongated the revenue recognition period by an additional quarter. They’ve also made decisions to move significant revenues (like those associated with SimCity’s launch) to later quarters. This makes it harder to parse the Non-GAAP revenue and compare to previous periods.
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