Activision: Case Study Essay

Activision was established in 1979 as a triad party video game developer- publisher. Formation of Activision has been one of the most(prenominal) probatory events for romp assiduity. Activision is publisher of one of the most famous game publisher right away. Games like Call of Duty, Guitar belligerent and Pitfall series are promulgated by Activision. Currently Activision is merged with Blizzard (creator of worlds most played subscription base game) to form Activision Blizzard manhoods largest fun company in a deal worth ? 9. 15 billion. somewhat the time of formation of Activision, companies used to dominate grocery place. looseness manufacture was not stable. but the things have changed today its a global multibillion dollar business. In the starting days of Activision, they had to compete with Atari in games. But later both companies came to understanding that availability of much game for Atari platforms meant more sales of hardware. And both companies kept build ing games for Atari platforms competing with one another and existence benefited from competition. Creating games is a long and expensive process as normal games repulse about 2 year and $20 million while MMOGs may take from $50 to $100 million in quintette years.What Activision and Atari started as co-operative competition still prevails in manoeuvre industry and has helped a enormous deal in development of gaming industries. In 2010 in that respect was 8% loss of packaged goods sales of consoles game but online receipts was booming. Activision was able to predict this change in gaming industry market and locate itself in front of customers. In 2010, around 50% of summarise revenue made by Activision came from digital sources. Since its merger with Blizzard, Activision is becoming more and more console independent.Starting as publisher for console games, today Activision publishes games for anything that can play games like ipad, iphone, phone social gaming (facebook), and so on And the ability to adapt to changing market has kept Activision in extend of the gaming industry for so long. There is an argument that more than fractional of Microsofts xbox live subscribers are there for Activisions Call of Duty. This tin an issue should Microsoft be the simply one being benefited from this while Activision only gets paid once during sale of game disk.This makes console gaming muted in compared to World of Warcrafts online subscription payment (Activision Blizzard charges fees for playing World of Warcraft online in PC). Activisions competitor EA games seems to have found a transparent solution, In order for online multiplayer, gamer have to either buy new disc or buy online registration code that allows them to go online using aged disc whose online code is already used. Activision could use this strategy restricting passel who bought used games and people who borrowed games to get online hence focusing only on customers who paid for online.For f irst gear time ever, in 2008 Activision was the number one US console and handheld game publisher in dollar. In 2008 it make two games Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare and Guitar Hero III Legends of Rock which were number second and first best merchandising game in US and Europe in dollars during fiscal year. scratch revenue earned by Activision in 2008 was $2. 9 billion. Activisions order gate model Greenlight Process has helped in development in its increase a lot. This process includes analysis of new products in development degree before entering market in four stages as concept, prototype, first playable and alpha.Making sure that product functions properly and is as demanded by current market customers is a very important step in product development which is carried out by high-level cross structural team. Keeping your product polished and problem free is very important. Gaming industry is product based market. Even though there go forth be customer grouping making your pr oduct fit and well is the most. If the product is good customer from another group can be attracted by this (RPG players are different than first person shooter players). In July 9 2008, Activision finally merged with Blizzard entertainment.Blizzard is owned by French conglomerate Vivendi and is the owner of World of Warcraft, worlds largest subscription based MMORPG. This merging helped Activision expand its reach in the industry. Instead of diversifying product Activision trip toward merging has proven rather useful. Gaming industry is one of the speedy growing industries. Changes occur daily in market place. Gaming industry started with text games then moved to cartridge based platforms to todays next gen consoles. And research shows that any gaming device staying in market for more than 10 years is considered to be outdated.So the change is pellucid and Activision has to be aware of these changes. Transition period between one genesis of console to another generation of con sole hugely effects gaming industry. Activisions performance record shows that gaming industry faces a huge halt at these times. During recession Activision was able to maintain its sales and gain curve but in 2005 when all console developers like Sony and Microsoft were preparing for tack of their new consoles gaming companies like Activision and its rival EA has to face depreciation in their business as customers are waiting for newer version of game and gaming consoles.