Strong Demand for New Games Drives Profitable Year for Take-Two

Strong demand for new games such as Red Dead Redemption allowed Take-Two Interactive to achieve a profit for a fiscal year that didn’t include a new Grand Theft Auto videogame release, CEO Ben Feder said Thursday. It was profitable for the year as well as Q4 ended Oct. 31, and revenue for each period grew.

Take-Two reported a profit from continuing operations of $54.2 million, 58 cents per share, for Q4, reversing the $7.9 million, 10 cents, loss in Q4 last year. Q4 revenue jumped 32 percent to $373.7 million. For the year, the company posted a profit from continuing operations of $49.7 million, 58 cents, reversing the $130.4 million, $1.70, loss the prior year. Revenue for the year grew 65 percent to $1.16 billion.

Along with Red Dead, the “strongest contributors” to Take-Two’s revenue growth and profitability for Q4 included the new releases NBA 2K11, Mafia II, Sid Meier’s Civilization V and New Carnival Games, it said. The best-performing catalog titles included Borderlands, Grand Theft Auto IV and several Nickelodeon titles, it said. Digitally delivered content “continued to be a meaningful component of Take-Two’s sales,” it said. The company’s 2K Sports division also achieved profitability during the period, Feder said.

The publisher will “pursue opportunities to enter newer areas of the interactive entertainment business, such as digitally delivered content and the expanding Asian and Latin American markets,” said Chairman Strauss Zelnick. An earnings call was held after our deadline.