Ubisoft's latest financial report revealed a highly disappointing fiscal year, in addition to providing an update on the company's near-term plans for the Assassin's Creed franchise, among other things. Its newest investor disclosure arrived mere hours before an alleged Assassin's Creed Mirage release date leaked online earlier today.
The company's previous financial report already warned investors to brace themselves for underwhelming full-year results. According to Ubisoft's February 2023 guidance, the company expected a 10% annual decline in net bookings for the fiscal year ending March 31.
Today's report revealed that decline to be nearly twice as bad as the February forecast, with Ubisoft reporting an equivalent of $1.89 billion in net bookings, an 18% drop compared to the previous year. For clarity, net bookings are a sum of all game sales and deferred net revenue, which entails income from subscription fees and pre-orders. Ubisoft's other key performance indicators didn't fare much better, as the company reported $538 million in net losses for the past fiscal year. The gaming giant ended the previous year approximately $87 million in the green.
The developer-publisher's annual sales decreased, as well, dropping from $2.31 billion to the equivalent of $1.97 billion over the 12-month period ending this past March. Ubisoft's stock tanked over four points in after-hours trading following its May 16 financial report. CEO Yves Guillemot attributed the disappointing results to industry-wide challenges that effectively saw the company shrink to its pre-pandemic levels. That notwithstanding, the report also revealed that Ubisoft is planning to expand the size of its teams working on the Assassin's Creed franchise by 40% over the next 12 months.
While such an expansion will presumably include some reshuffling and not be solely driven by hiring sprees, this plan still stands in contrast to the company's recent downsizing efforts. Earlier this month, Ubisoft laid off dozens of employees with no notice, raising poor management concerns among investors.
As for the studios most likely to benefit from this upcoming expansion, Ubisoft Bordeaux seems like a given, not least because that outfit is presently leading the development of Assassin's Creed Mirage, the next major installment in the long-running franchise. There's currently at least one other Assassin's Creed title in the works as part of an exclusive game agreement that Ubisoft signed with Netflix in September 2022. Ubisoft has yet to clarify which studio is handling the development of that mobile-only project, but regardless, that unnamed outlet is another likely candidate for this newly announced expansion of the Assassin's Creed teams.
Source: Ubisoft