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3DO jumps over 50 percent on new Internet strategy
SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 20 (Reuters) - Shares of the 3DO Co. (Nasdaq:THDO - news), a developer of video games, surged
54 percent after reporting that sales in the first half were up sharply, in part from a new Internet strategy.
The 3DO Co., based in Redwood City, Calif., said software revenues in the first half of its fiscal year were $14.6 million, a jump from $4.2 million in the first half of
1998.
Shares of 3DO - pronounced ''three dee oh'' - were up $2.65625, to $7, in very active trade.
3DO shares also got a boost from Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst James Lin, who raised his price target on the stock to $8 to $10 a share, up from $6. Lin,
who also has a buy rating on the stock, was not immediately available for comment.
3DO said it recently revamped the company Web site and that it is selling a couple of hundred thousand units of its games over the Internet. Some of its games,
such as Meridian 59, are completely Internet-based while other games, such as ''Might and Magic'' and ''Army Men'' have Internet components and can be played
over the Internet.
''That is a huge part of what you are seeing in the gaming community,'' said John Adams, 3DO's chief financial officer, in an interview. ''If it's not Internet playable,
then it's not of value to consumers...It is driving tremendous sell-through.''
Adams also said that Nintendo executives recently called 3DO's newly launched game BattleTanx the ''best multiplier game ever.'' Sales tripled in the first week of
sales. BattleTanx is 3DO's first video game for the Nintendo 64.
3DO was first founded as a hardware company by Trip Hawkins, a video gaming industry icon, in 1991, who hoped to compete with Sega and Nintendo with a
new game player based on CD-ROM technology. After its hardware failed to catch on, 3DO sold most of its hardware assets and reinvented itself as a software
company devoted to creating video games. |
