EA: PC Becoming World's Largest Games Platform

Electronic Arts chief financial officer Eric Brown has said that “the online part of our business is growing as much as 60% year over year" and that the PC is rapidly becoming the largest gaming platform in the world.

Speaking during the company’s quarterly and annual earnings call, Brown said that EA’s digital game distribution revenue has almost doubled year-over-year to $80 million. Digital direct revenue as a whole also grew to $400 million during the year ended March 31.

"This is a big year for us… In terms of distribution, the way we look at a lot what's happening in the future is, we've got probably a billion PCs out there in the world," he said, according to ShackNews. "Very rapidly the PC is becoming the largest gaming platform in the world, just not in a packaged-good product."

"As you look at what that means in terms of distribution of product, we think that's incredibly exciting because it's going to open the market to new demographics, new countries and new types of gameplay."

Company CEO John Riccitiello also said that EA plans to introduce two additional "online subscription services" later in the current fiscal year, although he didn't elaborate.

Last week EA Sports president Peter Moore told Edge that the division’s business model of “shipping a physical disc for the PC simply isn’t working” and that online was where the company’s products could be brought to life in the PC space.

"This is a big year for us… In terms of distribution, the way we look at a lot what's happening in the future is, we've got probably a billion PCs out there in the world," he said, according to ShackNews. "Very rapidly the PC is becoming the largest gaming platform in the world, just not in a packaged-good product."

"As you look at what that means in terms of distribution of product, we think that's incredibly exciting because it's going to open the market to new demographics, new countries and new types of gameplay."

Peter Crisp wrote:The world may indeed include 1 Billion PCs but how many of those are just work PCs that are unable to play games from even 4 or 5 years ago? I'm fairly sure that companies these days don't spend money on top of the line machines when they can get a PC that can do everything they need for a few hundred quid.