Activision Blizzard brings in $745 million during its third quarter

Activision Blizzard had an impressive third quarter which ended on September 30, 2010. The company exceeded its goals and brought in a very impressive $745 million in net revenue. This is compared to a net revenue of $600 million in the previous year. Activision Blizzard credits its excessive revenues to StarCraft II, World of Warcraft and the Call of Duty franchise. Activision Blizzard expects to earn $1.26 billion by the end of the fourth quarter.

During a conference call with investors, Activision Blizzard would not disclose how much money it has earned from digital sales. However the company did acknowledge its digital earnings accounted for almost half of its total revenue for its third quarter. The combined physical and digital sales of its games have resulted in Activision Blizzard having no debt as of September 30.

Moving forward, Activision is expecting continuing success from its most popular franchises. It will release Call of Duty: Black Ops later this month, followed by World of Warcraft: Cataclysm in early December.

In 2011, Activision will release another first-person CoD game and the series will expand into Asian territories. This could be the beginning of a CoD MMO, but Activision did not confirm that theory.

Here are some more interesting highlights from Activision Blizzard’s earnings call.

• The company believes time spent playing Activision Blizzard games is more than any television network
• Activision Blizzard expects to sell through the majority of Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock and Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions units this year
• 3 billion hours have been spent playing Modern Warfare 2 on Xbox Live alone
• Black Ops pre-orders are more than Modern Warfare 2
• Goldeneye on Wii is outselling MW2 on Wii when compared to the same time frame
• Activision Blizzard doesn’t expect the 3D function in Black Ops will help to sell more units

Via [Activision Blizzard] Read [Wall Street Journal]