Ultimate Team to add $5 profit per boxed FIFA 12 sale

EA Sports' Peter Moore is expecting the downloadable spin-off FIFA Ultimate Team to add a further $5 profit per unit sold of the FIFA 12 boxed release.

Speaking of the proven success of FIFA 11's Ultimate Team, he noted that only 40 per cent of players paid for extra content through Ultimate Team, but that still brought in an average $51 per paying user.

"FIFA 12 will launch on 12 platforms this year, and we expect double-digit growth over last year's game," added Moore following financial results that showed profits doubled off the back of boxed game sales.

FIFA 11 has so far sold 11 million units on all formats, with 3.3 million playing Ultimate Team, a downloadable card game available to PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 users.

"Next month at Gamescom in Cologne, we will unveil a plan to give FIFA 12 owners 100 per cent access to this mode," added Moore.

"I believe Ultimate Team could add as much as $5 of net revenue to every packaged goods unit sold of FIFA 12."

Moore also detailed his division's approach to Facebook, saying he expects EA Sports on the social network to be "not only a scalable, standalone business, but also as a gateway for bringing new players to deeper EA Sports experiences on consoles, tablets and smartphones."

Of the three Superstars games the company already has on Facebook - Madden, FIFA and World Series Baseball - the average lifetime revenue of those that spend money on the freemium titles is $56 per user, with Moore noting that figure "surpasses the net revenue we received from players on consoles."

"Facebook is a platform we will grow on with deeper and more engaging experiences for our fans," concluded Moore, and projects like Superstars are "just the tip of the iceberg of what we're looking to do."