wraggster
July 29th, 2006, 09:57
News from Gamespot (http://us.gamespot.com/news/6154892.html)
Sluggish sales of Sega Sammy's Pachinko slot machines dropped the company's profit almost 93 percent during its first quarter, the company announced today.
Japan-based Sega Sammy Holdings Inc., which owns both Sega Corp. and Sammy Corp., reported a profit of 779 million yen (about $6.8 million). It was a sharp drop from its 10.7 billion yen ($93 million) take during the same time last year. Pachinko slot machines accounted for just 2.2 billion yen ($19.1 million) of the company's earnings this quarter, compared with 18.2 billion yen ($158.9 million) last year. The company's overall revenue, however, slipped less dramatically--a 15 percent dip to 85.6 billion yen ($746 million).
Sega Sammy blamed higher "upfront development costs" in making games for a loss of 4.06 billion yen ($34.9 million) in its games division--about twice the amount it lost last year. Sales of its video games--particularly those in the Sonic franchise and Noryoku Trainer Portable 2--increased this year to 16.5 billion yen ($143.8 million) from 11.6 billion yen ($101 million). But the company's game-development expenses rose 7 billion yen ($61 million) from a year ago, eclipsing any profit it would have otherwise made.
Sega Sammy insisted that despite the financial setbacks, its previous full-year earnings commitments are still on track.
Sluggish sales of Sega Sammy's Pachinko slot machines dropped the company's profit almost 93 percent during its first quarter, the company announced today.
Japan-based Sega Sammy Holdings Inc., which owns both Sega Corp. and Sammy Corp., reported a profit of 779 million yen (about $6.8 million). It was a sharp drop from its 10.7 billion yen ($93 million) take during the same time last year. Pachinko slot machines accounted for just 2.2 billion yen ($19.1 million) of the company's earnings this quarter, compared with 18.2 billion yen ($158.9 million) last year. The company's overall revenue, however, slipped less dramatically--a 15 percent dip to 85.6 billion yen ($746 million).
Sega Sammy blamed higher "upfront development costs" in making games for a loss of 4.06 billion yen ($34.9 million) in its games division--about twice the amount it lost last year. Sales of its video games--particularly those in the Sonic franchise and Noryoku Trainer Portable 2--increased this year to 16.5 billion yen ($143.8 million) from 11.6 billion yen ($101 million). But the company's game-development expenses rose 7 billion yen ($61 million) from a year ago, eclipsing any profit it would have otherwise made.
Sega Sammy insisted that despite the financial setbacks, its previous full-year earnings commitments are still on track.