Assassin's Creed zorgt voor grote veranderingen bij Ubisoft

London, December 13, 2007

Today Ubisoft, one of the world’s largest video game publishers, announced record sales performance for its Assassin’s Creed™ video game, raised its guidance for fiscal 2007-08, updated its games release schedule, and issued its initial forecasts for 2008-09.

Record performance for Assassin's Creed™Assassin's Creed™ has greatly outstripped Ubisoft's sales expectations and currently ranks among the two or 3 best-selling games for the PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system and Xbox360® video game and entertainment system in the vast majority of geographical regions. In less than four weeks Assassin’s Creed™ recorded more than two and a half million units in sell-through sales worldwide, and is the fastest-selling new video game intellectual property in the US ever. Consequently, Ubisoft now forecasts that it will sell a minimum of five million units of the game in 2007-08 compared with its previous estimate of approximately three million.

2007-08 guidance raised and games release schedule updatedAs a result of this outstanding sales performance and solid showings from Ubisoft’s other games – particularly its “casual” range – Ubisoft has significantly raised its forecasts for 2007-08. At the same time it has strengthened the line-up of games for next year, with titles such as Tom Clancy’s EndWar™, Brothers In Arms Hell's Highway™ and Far Cry® 2 now scheduled for release in fiscal 2008-09 rather than the fourth quarter of 2007-08.

The sales target for 2007-08 has been raised to more than €840 million, with around €410 million for the third quarter, versus previous forecasts of €825 million and €330 million respectively.The target for current operating income before stock options has been significantly revised upwards to at least 12 percent of sales, compared with the previously announced forecast of at least 9 percent. This reflects the combined impact of the stellar performance turned in by Assassin’s Creed™ and the ensuing major leverage effect on profitability, as well as lower-than-anticipated research and development costs due to the postponed release dates for Tom Clancy's End War, Brothers in Arms and Far Cry 2.

Source: UbiSoft Investor's press release