In this area, Capcom has exemplified the common criticisms of Japanese console and PC companies by falling dramatically behind the times. The second is a stronger commitment to DLC with its consumer releases, with an aim of maximising the profitable life of each product.
First, to push for quality by bringing previously outsourced work back into the company, pledging to hire 100 new staff in each of its consumer, mobile and PC online teams by the end of fiscal 2014. At present, Capcom has just over $152 million in cash, which isn't much for a company attempting to navigate the costly transition to a new hardware generation and the company-wide implementation of a service-based infrastructure.Īny console titles that fail to perform in the next two years will be increasingly difficult to bear, and Capcom now has two mid-term strategies in place to mitigate that risk. However its performance throughout this generation has rarely been more than solid, leaving it in a difficult position for the challenges ahead. Between them, Capcom's three biggest console releases for the rest of this fiscal year are not expected to sell more than an under-performing Resident Evil 6 managed in six months.Ĭapcom's annual report notes the sluggish performance of the all-important console market on several occasions, and it certainly isn't the only company to feel the negative effects of that slowdown. But Lost Planet 3 is another matter - it may only need to sell 1.2 million to meet expectations, but it is off to a poor start in Japan, and its sales in the UK suggest that it will be among the calendar year's most notable failures. The console release of Resident Evil: Revelations, launched in May, should also hit its relatively lowly 1.2 million target. Monster Hunter 4, which is scheduled for release this month, seems likely to meet its expected 2.8 million sales by the end of March 2014. If it meets those expectations, however, it's unlikely to be down to packaged retail releases.Ĭapcom has forecast even slimmer returns for the next fiscal year, with only 13 million unit sales expected from a line-up that includes Lost Planet 3, Monster Hunter 4 and Dead Rising 3. Nevertheless, Capcom expects revenue to hold next year and profits to roughly double, bringing it back in line with fiscal 2012's results. "If the DLC we are providing to users is deemed uninteresting from the start, there will be no ongoing business to pursue" Haruhiro Tsujimoto, COO, Capcom
Capcom's single biggest success story in the console/PC space was Dragon's Dogma, a new IP, which sold a relatively modest 1.3 million units. Indeed, two of that group performed well short of expectations: Resident Evil 6 sold 4.9 million against expectations of 7 million, and DmC: Devil May Cry sold 1.15 million units on expectations of 2 million. In total, Capcom sold 14 million units of its games at retail, and only three releases passed 1 million sales. Barring 2010, when it made a profit of $22 million, that makes fiscal 2013 Capcom's least profitable year since 2005. While revenue actually climbed from ¥82 billion ($820m) to ¥94 billion ($940m) in the year ended March 31 2013, the company's attempts to pivot in virtually every aspect of its Digital Contents business - which comprises console, PC and mobile development, and accounted 67.7 per cent of all revenue - saw profits fall by more than half to just $31 million. Capcom's fiscal 2013 report has stressed the need for sweeping change in the company, as it rebounds from a difficult period straight into the costs of a new hardware generation and an increasingly competitive mobile market.
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