French mobile games producer Gameloft said a restructuring programme led it to post a net loss of EUR 24.2 million in full-year 2015, widening from a EUR 6.4 million loss a year earlier. Sales meanwhile grew 13 percent over the year to EUR 256.2 million and the company expects a mobile advertising boom to raise revenues to more than EUR 350 million by 2018.
Current operating profit totalled EUR 2.1 million in 2015, reversing a EUR 1.1 million loss posted a year earlier, and the company said this is set to rise to EUR 65 million in 2018. It also set a cumulative free cash-flow target of more than EUR 85 million over the period 2016-2018.
The company's EUR 10.3 million restructuring plan, which included the departure of 850 staff, helped Gameloft reverse a current operating loss of EUR 4.0 million in the first half and post a profit of EUR 6.0 million in the second, aided also by a EUR 6.9 million decline in R&D costs.The company closed 10 development studios from December 2014 to the end of January 2016, representing gross savings of approximately EUR 35.0 million over the year.
By region over the full year, EMEA (Europe, Middle-East and Africa) accounted for 30 percent of sales, followed by North America at 25 percent, Asia-Pacific at 30 percent and Latin America at 15 percent.
Looking forward, Gameloft said it is in the early stages of a major development cycle focused on programmatic advertising and that its new in-house advertising agency is now running at full capacity.
The company ended 2015 with a net cash position of EUR 36.9 million, a slight increase compared to 30 June 2015 but down from EUR 52.7 million a year earlier.
On 18 February, Vivendi, which already owns a 30 percent stake in Gameloft announced a takeover bid at EUR 6 per share. It later raised the bid to EUR 7.20 after the target said the offer was too low. On 3 March Gameloft’s Guillemot family raised its stake in the group to over 21 percent in order to resist Vivendi's hostile bid.
