News
6Rovio: we're worth more than PopCap
In the wake of EA's $750 million acquisition of PopCap, Ville Heijari, VP of franchise development at Angry Birds developer Rovio, admits the studio has had "discussions with many different companies" about selling the business. "We really think we have a lot of opportunities with our IP and there's a lot of creativity at the studio beyond Angry Birds," he told Eurogamer. "But the valuation from our point of view is somewhere, I dunno, maybe north of PopCap."
Source: Eurogamer
Comments
6That's all very well, but Rovio's value is based entirely on one hit game and an astute approach to merchandising and licencing. PopCap on the other hand, have proven far more prolific and, I would argue, demonstrated significantly more design talent.
I'm not sure if the Rovio guy understands how worth is calculated. Selling 150 million units of a game that costs a dollar is great, but Popcap stands to make over a billion on their sale. The last time I looked, 150 million dollars in revenue over two years multiplied by one is not a billion dollars.
No, it's you who has absolutely no idea how company worth is calculated.
Protip - don't multiply revenue by 1.
Note - I don't actually think Rovio is justified at a valuation above that of Popcap's.
I'm simplifying the economics for people who have a hard time figuring stuff out on the internet. Take yourself, for example.
Quick, besides Angry Birds, name another one of Rovio's games. Anyone? They've had exactly one breakout hit to PopCap's dozens. I like Angry Birds, in spite of it being essentially a charming reskinning of Crush the Castle. But I'm not sure the folks at Rovio have many lessons to teach besides how to recognize a breakout when it happens and double-down through expansions and ancillary licensing. I'm a little bit tired of them holding themselves up as examples of How to Succeed in Mobile.
I totally get what you're all saying here but I don't Rovio think they are just a games company. The way they are branching out into cartoons and other media makes them a bit different to Popcap. I hope for their sakes that they're doing all this with more than just their one Angry Birds property though.