So far, Pokemon GO (Free) has made a lot of money. It’s jumped high up the top grossing ranks almost instantaneously in the countries where it has been released. And Nintendo has seen a massive bump in their stock price because of it. But even Nintendo is saying that investors should take caution – because they do not own Pokemon and Pokemon GO entirely, they are not adjusting their revenue reports yet. Pseudonymous gaming industry analyst ZhugeEX has a transcript of Nintendo President Tatsumi Kimishima’s statement:
Nintendo have issued a statement on financial impact of Pokemon Go on the current fiscal year forecast. pic.twitter.com/0fIbqJrpNL
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) July 22, 2016
Now, the Pokemon franchise is seen as an intrinsically Nintendo thing – ask a random player on the street, and they’ll probably tell you it’s a Nintendo game. And it’s not wrong, but not entirely the truth. This flowchart kind of explains what the situation is with Nintendo, Niantic, and Pokemon:
This flowchart helps describe the development team behind #PokemonGO. pic.twitter.com/AOomHgcwZA
— Pokémon GO News (@PokemonGoNews) July 18, 2016
So, Nintendo might not be seeing a lot of money directly from Pokemon GO because we don’t know how much Niantic’s getting, and Nintendo has stakes in both The Pokemon Company and Niantic. So, Nintendo’s likely set to make a lot of money off of Pokemon GO, yes, but not all of it. Still, if the game comes anywhere close to the billions that optimistic investors think that it’s worth, then everyone involved is going to be feeling pretty good for themselves. And Nintendo will have some good momentum for their future mobile plans. Plus, that Pokemon GO Plus accessory? Nintendo is manufacturing and distributing it, and large sales of that could affect their revenue forecast in a way that the app might not do.
