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Take-Two Only Lost $US 38 Million Last Quarter, Seems Pleased
Posted by Michael McWhertor at 2:07 PM on March 12, 2008
Take-Two Interactive had plenty to sing about today. There was the official word on BioShock 2, even more Carnival Games for little girls and boys to enjoy and a reaffirmation of Grand Theft Auto IV's worldwide ship date of April 29. Yay! Sure, there were some delays, but all in all, not bad. The best news? The company managed to only lose 38 million US bucks in its first fiscal quarter of 2008! That's better than the Take-Two gang had expected, with Strauss Zelnick, Chairman of Take-Two, saying he was "pleased". This is how you lose money, people—with a faint hint of a smile on your face.
In a call to investors and analysts, Zelnick and crew chalked up the better than planned for quarter to sales of stuff like Carnival Games and Manhunt 2, plus portions of Take-Two's back catalogue. I'm not much of a gambler, but I'd be willing to wager that next quarter, they'll do much, much better.
Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. Reports First Quarter Fiscal 2008 Financial Results [Take-Two]
Comments (AU Comments · US Comments)
There are currently no AU comments for this post.
HurricaneDave
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
If Take-Two cut the fact and sold some of their units until they had a small core they would probably be in a better financial state. I never understood why they tried to expand so much.
HurricaneDave
Drocketx
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
Actually, I don't think its particularly 'ridiculous' for a game company to operate at a loss, now and then. Games take a long time and a lot of money to develop, and you tend to only make the big bucks on them during the first month of release. On any one individual game, you have 2-3 years of 'loss', followed by a single quarter of massive profit.
Big companies, obviously, have a lot of irons on the fire at once, and that tends to smooth out the income over time, but if don't have any big releases scheduled for a quarter, you pretty much have a massive loss for the quarter, regardless of the overall health/long-term profitability of the company.
Drocketx
Thassodar
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
I like that pic. I need to redo all my pics like that, with Hell Yes.
Zelnick: Hey guys guess what, we only lost $38 million! That's less than we spent on high-priced Vietnamese prostitutes last month! Hell yes.
Shareholders: LAWSUIT'D!!!!
Thassodar
Pornosaur
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
Well if Halo 3 did a $170 million as reported, it will be interesting to see what GTA IV does on opening "week" on two systems. I still know people that only have an xbox 360 or Ps3 for this title alone. A few of them have been dragged down the dark path though and bought Rock Band and Call of Duty 4.
Pornosaur
_Ted_
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
hang in there take 2 you'll be rich in no time. (well more rich)
_Ted_
huginn - No I will not give you a hug!
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
and about half of that 38 million went towards boosting there stock price to fight off the EA take over.
That and oh, a pretty shitty q4 that had a lack of their AAA titles such as GTA4 and the bomb known as manhunt2.
I'd be pleased too all things considered. They weren't taken over just before their moment of glory known as GTA4
huginn - No I will not give you a hug!
vism
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
@Teqonix: Take Two is the big company. They bought the sports developers from Sega back when and took the 2k Sports brand with it. Then they formed 2K Games as like a sub publishing company for certain games. Not certain if it's actually a company itself or just a label.
vism
Teqonix
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
@crapsh00t - Ooh! Ooh! Business major to the rescue! See the income statement for them (Or consolidated statements of operations) about halfway down the page? Well, take a look at the Gross Profit part. That's basically Revenues - COGS (Cost of Goods Sold, which includes paying their developers, apparently). That comes out to around $54 million. Now you have to subtract other expenses like Interest Expense, Taxes, R&D, etc. from Gross Profit to get your Net Profit or Net Loss - Take 2's total operating expenses come to around $87 million. Now, take $54 - $87 and you get their net loss which in this case is around $38 million buckos.
Teqonix
purplehanz
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
Here's an idea that could easily solve their problem: stop paying yourself so much money, Idiots!
purplehanz
Goatfish
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
@antialias02: Carnival Games, while it sucked, sold like hotcakes.
Goatfish
crapsh00t
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
I second the question regarding how this loss was calculated. It would be very interesting to see.
crapsh00t
Teqonix
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
Why do I keep thinking that Take 2 and 2k are different companies? Every time I see Bioshock and Take 2 associated with each other I get a little confused.
Can anyone help me out with this?
Teqonix
testmunky
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
@DaiMacculate: looks like costs were higher than revenue, no weird accounting involved(although they did have a really high tax expense for some reason)
testmunky
Darthvinder
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
$38 million? That's it? I can beat that, pshaw. But seriously, what the fuck guys? Do better, please? kthx.
Darthvinder
Cogito
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
Big business never ceases to amaze me. A smile at losing 38 million dollars? Would that I was able to throw that away.
Cogito
antialias02
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
Take-Two was responsible for Carnival Games? No wonder they lost 38 million.
antialias02
DaiMacculate
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
Did they "lose" 38 million because their operations exceeded income for that period, or some more complex accounting reason having to do with game development in general?
I'm sure the answer will give me a headache either way ;)
DaiMacculate
peAr_nectAr
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
@JohnnytheFuture: Or more.
peAr_nectAr
JohnnytheFuture
Posted 10:43 PM 19/3/08
Yes, next quarter, I wouldn't be surprise if they profited the same amount they lost.
JohnnytheFuture