Posts Tagged ‘sulake’

Habbo Hotel publisher Sulake cuts staff, tests facebook app

Monday, December 21st, 2009

Sulake, the Finland based publisher of virtual world Habbo Hotel has recently let 28 staff members go. Originally discussed back in October, the company planned to reduce staff by 20%, or around 40 jobs. Obviously, plans were altered, as the final number ended up being 12 persons short of this original projection. Sulake communication specialist Jahani Lassila commented that the current restructuring and cuts have, “dramatically improved profitability.”

However, according to articstartup.com, some Sulake staff members have chosen to leave by their own accord (perhaps the missing 12?), and that the internal atmosphere at Sulake is somewhat less than joyous.

However, on the other side of the coin, Sulake has announced that they’re actively working on adapting their popular teen title Habbo Hotel to a facebook ready application. Signaling their true commitment to the project, Sulake has also recently integrated a Facebook login options with all global Habbo Hotel sites. In doing so, Sulake has effectively removed the hurdle of joining the virtual world, as the registration process is greatly streamlined.

Habbo

The United Kingdom Facebook crowd has first dibs on the Habbo Hotel integration. Sulake is currently testing the project on Facebook UK, but not limited usage to UK users alone. To have a go at Habbo Hotel on Facebook, head on over and see how close it is to the stand alone version. Personally, if I didn’t know that this platform was on Facebook, I’d believe I was playing a ‘regular’ version of Habbo.

While Sulake has yet to release any information about when they’ll release the project to the global Facebook community, but not limited who and who can not use the app, chances are that they’re already in the middle of a soft launch.

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Sulake contracts, True Game expands

Thursday, October 8th, 2009

SulakeSulake, the Finnish parent company behind the successful virtual world Habbo Hotel is expected to lay off 40 staff members (20 percent of their global workforce). The news arrived yesterday via effected employee’s tweets, as well as articstartup.com, with layoffs to be focused in Helsinki.

Sulake employs approximately 300 people across 13 countries, and claims in the neighborhood of 12 million monthly unique visits to it’s tween-friendly virtual world Habbo Hotel. While Habbo Hotel features a number virtual celebrities’ represented in the world, in 2008 Sulake reported that they’d garnered around €50 million ($73 million) in revenues, but only turned a profit of around €1 million ($1.5 million).

In addition to Habbo Hotel, Sulake also runs the Finnish social networking platform IRC-Galleria, and recently launched another virtual world, Bobba, this time centered around a smartphone platform, with eventual plans to port the virtual world to a PC platform. Bobba is aimed at attracting an older demographic than then tween focused Habbo Hotel.

And on the other side of the coin….

Irvine, California based True Games, which recently announced the opening of a new development studio in Austin, Texas, seems to be on the growth warpath. Announced yesterday, True Games has now established an External Development Division and is now seeking to publish new content on it’s TrueTech gaming platform. Not limited to one genre, True Games seems to be seeking a full catalogue of offerings, including but not limited to RPG, RTS, racing, FPS, sports, action, simulation, and the list goes on. This content may be original or licensed online games that would be operated under the microtransaction model.

“We currently have several top quality products in development, but in addition to our own content, we also want to take advantage of our extremely capable TrueTech platform’s capabilities by operating additional online games. There are developers out there creating amazing online content, however, they don’t have the means to bring it to market on their own. That is exactly the kind of partner we are looking for,” said Jeff Lujan founder and CEO of True Games.

As for Sulake, it’s an interesting twist. While Habbo is one of the most popular destinations for their target market, taking in $73 million in revenues and only producing $1.5 million in profit is certainly cause to raise an eyebrow. With that said, the buzz surrounding Habbo has been nothing but positive for as long as memory serves, and a 20 percent staff reduction seems a bit out of the ordinary. A harbinger of darker days ahead for the Finnish firm? Hopefully not. And again, heading in a completely opposite direction, True Games seems to be poised to pounce on the microtransaction market. Their first release, Epic Warrior seems to be doing well in an already competitive market, a highly anticipated release just around the corner (Mytheon), a new studio in Austin, and now an external development team? True Games…one to watch.

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Habbo says: MySpace and YouTube are more popular that Facebook

Friday, June 5th, 2009

According to a recent survey released by Habbo, MySpace and YouTube are more popular amongst the 11 – 19 year old age group than facebook.  The study was conducted in April 2009, and surveyed 112,000 teens from over 30 countries.  Conspicuously, only 4%, or 4,500 teens were from the US.

According to the Global Habbo Youth Survey brand update 2009, facebook now holds the number 3 spot, up from number 5 last year with US teens.  However, globally, YouTube and facebook take the number 1 and 2 spots, respectively, with MySpace coming in at number 4.

Sulake, Finland based parent company of Habbo, which claims close to 12 million unique users globally, with comScore data tallying Habbo at 3 million monthly users in the US, also surveyed teens on their attitudes towards brands.  Sulake deliberately excluded Habbo from the response list in order to keep the dataset impartial.

The results are not surprising, with 50 percent of American teens being more brand conscious than any other global group surveyed.  American teens felt it’s important to express their individuality, and expect their brands to help them out.  Conversely, only 38 percent of global respondents shared the same attitudes towards brands as their American counterparts.

While Habbo makes the vast majority of it’s revenues from the sale of virtual goods via microtransactions, some $74 million in 2008 according to Sulake, the virtual world has stepped up their real world marketing tie ins.  In January, the company signed a deal with Fox and Freemantle Media to provide a virtual version of American Idol, complete with in-world avatars of AI contestants.

So here’s the thing.  MySpace’s parent company is Fox Media.  As mentioned above, conspicuously, only 4 percent of those surveyed were American teens.  Granted, while this data is all encompassing, and not solely from the dataset surveyed, a quick compete.com search clearly has facebook blowing both YouTube and MySpace out of the water.  Sulake surveyed 112,000 teens from 30 countries.  We’re not given specific country by country breakdown numbers, but I would hope that one of the largest consuming countries in the world, not to mention home of all three mentioned, would get a slightly larger slice of the pie than others. And even if American teens were under represented in the numbers, what’s the survey pool?  Do all 4,500 of these teens have YouTube, MySpace, and facebook accounts?  Again, just looking at the overall compete.com data, something seems a bit skewed here.  I’m not saying the Sulake and Habbo data is dead wrong, but given the rise of facebook, and the gradual decline of MySpace, something just seems out of place here.

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