It’s not every quarter that Ubisoft’s financials merit a post or even a mention, but the company has been a low-key mess for the last year or two, first with its very own sexual harassment scandal, then wild delays, and then the tone-deaf attempt to shove its own Quartz-branded NFTs into Ghost Recon Breakpoint – NFTs so few people bought that the company wound up maintenance-moding the game. The most recent rumor floating out of the studio was that it was being shopped around to private equity firms – a rumor Ubisoft continues to embrace.
With all that in mind, it won’t surprise you too much to learn that the company’s sales took a hit over the last year, down 4.4% compared to the 2020-2021 period according to the new full-year earnings figures, though its most recent quarter was up significantly year-over-year. Ubisoft attributes the that to its Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, and Rainbow Six franchises, as well as its back catalogue.
“IFRS 15 sales for the fourth quarter of 2021-22 came to €708.0 million, up 41.1% (or 38.0% at constant exchange rates) on the €501.8 million generated in fourth-quarter 2020-21. IFRS 15 sales for full-year 2021-22 totaled €2,125.2 million, down 4.4% (or 4.8% at constant exchange rates) versus the 2020-21 figure of €2,223.8 million. Fourth-quarter 2021-22 net bookings totaled €664.2 million, up 37.0% (or 33.7% at constant exchange rates) on the €484.9 million recorded for fourth-quarter 2020-21. Net bookings for full-year 2021-22 amounted to €2,128.5 million, down 5.0% (or 5.4% at constant exchange rates) on the €2,240.6 million figure for 2020-21.”
Notably, the company’s Avatar game, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora and the long-delayed Skull & Bones are both listed as “premium” inbound titles expected to create “significant topline growth.” Both should be out by the end of March next year if this schedule holds, which comports with the expectations Ubisoft set last February.
What’s most interesting about the report is what’s not in it. As MMO Fallout adeptly noted, the print report doesn’t so much as breathe the words Quartz, NFT, blockchain, or crypto; we tend to agree with his read that it’s more about embarrassment than resignation, but we’re also guessing the ongoing collapse of multiple cryptocurrencies and NFTs this month wouldn’t have made the best backdrop for whatever scheme the company is trying next.
