Europe is Now Ubisoft’s Biggest Market

Lazard Capital Markets analyst Colin Sebastian may claim that the European game market is equal in size to that of North America, but for Ubisoft, it’s even larger. In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz at the Leipzig Games Convention last week, Ubisoft’s CEO Yves Guillemot explain that, thanks to the strength of the pound and euro, Europe is a larger market than the U.S. by more than 5%.

First, our money – the pound or the euro – is very strong and because of that the turnover from those countries is heavier than they used to be. So for Ubisoft turnover Europe is actually more important than the US now, and by more than 5 per cent. It’s become a very strong market for us.

I think there are lots of customers that want to play – because in Europe we love to play – the only problem we had was that the games were becoming more and more difficult to play. Now that there’s more accessibility, some accessories that are helping people to have fun, I think this market has no limit in the growth it can have if we can make sure that the people that are coming in are staying.

A game like EndWar, for example, which you can control by voice – it’s totally changing the industry because it gives you the opportunity to command what’s happening, and to have a quick answer to the orders you give. And it’s the same for a lot of other games, like the party games you can play – the games with guitars are also helping things to increase the fun, and bring more people. Because when you have fun with your family on the game, you take them into more games with you.

While Guillemot didn’t mention it specifically, you can’t help but think he’s referring to the Wii (and DS) when talking about there being “more accessibility.” Nevertheless, it’ll be interesting to see if the current economic predicament that the U.S. is in will result in other publishers finding greater percentages of their revenue coming from other territories.