CD Projekt becomes Europe’s most-valuable gaming company

CD Projekt Group (CPD), the Polish game development company that includes video game studio CD Projekt Red and digital storefront GOG.com just hit a milestone. It has beaten out French giant Ubisoft to become Europe’s most-valuable gaming company.

Success in Europe

This comes via data from the Warsaw Stock Exchange. According to a market valuation of CD Projekt, makers of hit games like The Witcher III: Wild Hunt, the developer is valued at 36.5 billion Polish zloty, which equates to around eight billion euros. Ubisoft, on the other hand, is known for its Assassin’s Creed and Far Cry game series, with a market valuation of 7.82 billion euros in comparison.

Though this is a major accomplishment for the studio, this doesn’t necessarily mean increased profits. CDP posted a net profit of 175 million Polish zloty (38.5 million euros) in 2019, whereas Ubisoft generated 416.2 million euros in revenue during the third fiscal quarter of 2019 alone. So there’s a small difference in revenue generated by the studios’ games.

But this doesn’t detract from CDP’s accomplishment. Becoming the highest-valued maker of video games in Europe is an incredible accomplishment for a company that only began by selling retro PC games on Good Old Games (GOG). Even still, its previous two Witcher games failed to set the standards for mainstream gaming.

A look at GOG

However, GOG still delivers significant income for CD Projekt, as the platform now not only sells old games, but also indie titles and some blockbuster mainstream games. Still, the majority of CDP’s success comes from the popularity of The Witcher franchise. Before the third entry released in 2015, it had more than 1.5 million pre-orders. The first two weeks following its release, it sold four million copies.

The success of The Witcher franchise

The Witcher III has since been met with overwhelming popularity and holds a score of 93 (out of 100) on Metacritic based on 32 pro reviews. It also holds an audience score on the same website of 9.4 out of 10.

Sales for the games increased during December 2019 when Netflix debuted its TV show based on the fantasy setting. Sales for the game rose by an incredible 554 percent during December 2019 versus the same month the previous year. Since last December, The Witcher III and its two expansion packs have been sold a combined total of 28 million copies.

What’s next for CD Projekt

The studio is furiously at work on its next upcoming release, Cyberpunk 2077. This game is based on the pen-and-paper role player game setting of the same name. The title is expected to release in September on both current and next-generation consoles and PC. Once this happens, this should further boost the company’s performance on the stock market.

Ryan Goodrich

Ryan has been writing since long before he could even write. He's written resumes, software user guides, consumer electronic reviews, and myriad web content spanning a variety of industries. But now he's writing about video games, which is much more interesting.

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