Hot Five

Hot Five: Ubisoft buyout speculation, Meta expects billion-dollar losses until 2030s, Q1 2022 financial reports, and App Store removal notice strikes indie devs

The hottest news articles on PG.biz

Hot Five: Ubisoft buyout speculation, Meta expects billion-dollar losses until 2030s, Q1 2022 financial reports, and App Store removal notice strikes indie devs

To keep you up to date on the biggest news in mobile gaming, we round up the five most-read stories on PocketGamer.biz each week.

Read on and digest…

1. Ubisoft could soon receive numerous buyout offers

A number of firms such as Blackstone Inc. and KKR are said to have interest in a takeover of France-based games publisher Ubisoft.

Details, however, remain extremely unclear: Ubisoft has yet to enter significant discussions with any of the potential buyers and it remains unclear how receptive the publisher would be to any prospective offer.

2. Activision Blizzard Q1 financial results reveal substantial decline

Activision Blizzard’s first quarter 2022 financial resultshave revealed a substantial decline in net revenue, which sunk over $500 million from $2.27 billion in Q1 2021 to $1.76 billion in the equivalent period in 2022.

Despite declines across Activision Blizzard, King’s in-game net bookings increased eight per cent year-over-year, with Candy Crush remaining the top-grossing game franchise in US app stores.

3. The latest App Store notice is causing concern for indie devs

The new notice states that apps that haven’t been updated in some time are "to be removed from sale in 30 days", unless an app update is submitted within the time period.

Sensor Tower speculation estimates as many as 7,000 apps may be removed, of which mobile games are most at risk, depending on the imprecise terms set by Apple.

4. Zuckerberg warns metaverse losses will continue until 2030s

Marring Meta’s first quarterly results for 2022 was the news that Reality Labs, the firm’s metaverse division, operated at a loss of $2.96 billion.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg stated: “It’s not going to be until those products really hit the market and scale in a meaningful way, and this market ends up being big, that this will be a big revenue or profit contributor to the business."

5. Angry Birds is the most popular mobile game in the US, according to search volumes

Angry Birds appears as the top result for seven states from Illinois to Minnesota, yet to be dethroned by any mobile title since 2010.

Rovio also recently announced a 26 per cent revenue increase in its Q1 2022 financial report.


Editor

Former editor of PocketGamer.biz, Khai can also be found on Vice, Star Trek, and in numerous scientific journals and publications.