Gameloft sales up 15 per cent in first half of 2011
French publisher Gameloft has reported sales of €76.8 million for the first half of calendar 2011, up 15 per cent year-over-year. The firm said the growth was driven by sales in emerging markets and by the success of its smartphone and tablet games, sales of which grew 55 per cent over the previous year. Gameloft plans to launch approximately 20 smartphone and tablet games during the second half of 2011, which it forecast should drive “solid sequential growth in the third and fourth quarters”. In the long-term, the company says it “appears to be in an ideal position to benefit from the rapid emergence of the digital distribution of video games on mobile phones, tablets, social networks, TVs and consoles”. Last September, Gameloft announced that it had achieved over 20 million game sales through the App Store, having released 100 titles since the digital distribution platform’s launch two years earlier. The company was formed in 1999 by the Guillemot family brothers, who are also the founders and owners of Ubisoft.