EA Mobile refocuses mobile publishing strategy
Publishing giant moves towards direct-to-consumer retail operations
EA Mobile SVP Mitch Lasky has declared the company's intention to move away from the traditional mobile game distribution model, cutting out mobile carriers and promoting and selling its wireless products directly to end users.
Speaking at the Harris Nesbitt Games Go Mobile Conference in New York City, Lasky announced several new titles based on major videogame franchises which the company will be publishing on the mobile platform, following EA's much publicised acquisition of Jamdat and its determined push towards dominating the mobile gaming space.
"We are actively trying to create new demand for mobile content, demand that we can monetise in a profitable, scalable, and defensible way," Lasky commented, outlining the company's strategy for developing "a series of integrated desktop, console, and mobile community applications."
Lasky believes that the future lies in off-portal sales and distribution, effectively cutting out the need for reliance on securing a high profile slot on a carrier's mobile games portal to promote products and encourage sales (instantly boosting potential revenues by negating any percentage share for mobile carriers) and focusing instead on direct communication with its customers to create and fully utilise brand awareness and loyalty.
Demonstrating a new desktop application which transfers games and content purchased and downloaded from a retail website directly to consumer's mobile phones, Lasky commented: "In addition to providing increased marketing relevance and a deeper emotional connection to our brands, these remarkable new applications will open up new ways for us to sell content directly to our customers without the necessity of spending tens of millions of dollars running ads on MTV, etc."
EA has long maintained a dominant position in the traditional videogames sector, and holds ambitions to replicate that success in the mobile arena. With the extensive catalogue of products, licenses and IP from Jamdat, together with its own vast library of franchises to leverage, the company appears committed to its ambition of changing the face of mobile gaming.