10 Million Subscribers - That’s a Lot of Money!

Posted 24th Jan 2008 05:23 PM by Maticus

An article on playfuls.com speculates how much money Blizzard has left over at the end of the year, based on its recently announced subscription base of 10 million players.

First off, 10 million monthly subscribers at around $15 a pop means $150 million a month income for Blizz, that’s just under $1.8 billion a year. The article’s author estimates that server costs and maintenance comes to around $100 million a year, customer service and content creation probably cost around $20 million a year, so that leaves Blizz with roughly $1.68 billion a year. 

Now obviously there are taxes to be taken into account, but still, that’s a whacking profit. From a personal point of view, I find it reassuring to know that the company who run the game I invest so much time and effort in, are financially comfortable, and are very unlikely to pull the plug any time soon. It also means that there will probably be a lot on money spent on WoW and future games by Blizzard, which is certainly good news for gaming fans, whichever way you look at it.




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mesonm
Posted 24, Jan 2008 06:30 PM
(0)
 

wow…a THIRD thread on Blizzard having 10 million subscribers….?
They should have money left over…or they wouldn’t be profitable.

Reply
 
mesonm
Posted 24, Jan 2008 06:30 PM
(0)
 

wow…a THIRD thread on Blizzard having 10 million subscribers….?
They should have money left over…or they wouldn’t be profitable.

Reply
 
Gavriel
Posted 24, Jan 2008 07:03 PM
(0)
 
[QUOTE=Maticus;4087639]An First off, 10 million monthly subscribers at around $15 a pop means $150 million a month income for Blizz, that’s just under $1.8 billion a year. The article’s author estimates that server costs and maintenance comes to around $100 million a year, customer service and content creation probably cost around $20 million a year, so that leaves Blizz with roughly $1.68 billion a year. 

http://www.blizzard.com/press/080122.shtml

Your numbers are a bit off, but it is a common mistake that people make. According to Blizzard 5.5 million of those players are in Asia. Chinese players, who would make up the vast majority of that subscriber base, pay 0.45 Yuan, or US$0.06 per hour to play. They would need to play 8 hours a day for every day of the month to come close to the US cost per month. Of course, they are restricted to the number of hours they are allowed to play concurrently per day.

It is still a very profitable enterprise however. Time to browse their employment opportunities, I think.

Reply
 
Gavriel
Posted 24, Jan 2008 07:03 PM
(0)
 
[QUOTE=Maticus;4087639]An First off, 10 million monthly subscribers at around $15 a pop means $150 million a month income for Blizz, that’s just under $1.8 billion a year. The article’s author estimates that server costs and maintenance comes to around $100 million a year, customer service and content creation probably cost around $20 million a year, so that leaves Blizz with roughly $1.68 billion a year. 

http://www.blizzard.com/press/080122.shtml

Your numbers are a bit off, but it is a common mistake that people make. According to Blizzard 5.5 million of those players are in Asia. Chinese players, who would make up the vast majority of that subscriber base, pay 0.45 Yuan, or US$0.06 per hour to play. They would need to play 8 hours a day for every day of the month to come close to the US cost per month. Of course, they are restricted to the number of hours they are allowed to play concurrently per day.

It is still a very profitable enterprise however. Time to browse their employment opportunities, I think.

Reply
 
Gavriel
Posted 24, Jan 2008 07:03 PM
(0)
 
[QUOTE=Maticus;4087639]An First off, 10 million monthly subscribers at around $15 a pop means $150 million a month income for Blizz, that’s just under $1.8 billion a year. The article’s author estimates that server costs and maintenance comes to around $100 million a year, customer service and content creation probably cost around $20 million a year, so that leaves Blizz with roughly $1.68 billion a year. 

http://www.blizzard.com/press/080122.shtml

Your numbers are a bit off, but it is a common mistake that people make. According to Blizzard 5.5 million of those players are in Asia. Chinese players, who would make up the vast majority of that subscriber base, pay 0.45 Yuan, or US$0.06 per hour to play. They would need to play 8 hours a day for every day of the month to come close to the US cost per month. Of course, they are restricted to the number of hours they are allowed to play concurrently per day.

It is still a very profitable enterprise however. Time to browse their employment opportunities, I think.

Reply
 
lothaer
Posted 24, Jan 2008 07:07 PM
(0)
 

will all that money they make you’d think they’d be able to release bug free patches ><.

Reply
 
lothaer
Posted 24, Jan 2008 07:07 PM
(0)
 

will all that money they make you’d think they’d be able to release bug free patches ><.

Reply
 
lothaer
Posted 24, Jan 2008 07:07 PM
(0)
 

will all that money they make you’d think they’d be able to release bug free patches ><.

Reply
 
Leviathonlx
Posted 24, Jan 2008 07:18 PM
(0)
 
[QUOTE=lothaer;4087686]will all that money they make you’d think they’d be able to release bug free patches ><.


All the money in the world doesn’t make bugs in code disappear and thats part of the reason for the PTR. Microsoft is a perfect example of that. Even then some bugs cannot be fixed before the deadline for the release of the patch and so the ‘lesser’ bugs get put on hold over the larger ones till later patches when they can be addressed.

Reply
 
Leviathonlx
Posted 24, Jan 2008 07:18 PM
(0)
 
[QUOTE=lothaer;4087686]will all that money they make you’d think they’d be able to release bug free patches ><.


All the money in the world doesn’t make bugs in code disappear and thats part of the reason for the PTR. Microsoft is a perfect example of that. Even then some bugs cannot be fixed before the deadline for the release of the patch and so the ‘lesser’ bugs get put on hold over the larger ones till later patches when they can be addressed.

Reply
 
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