The exceedingly competitive and profitable nature of the industry has created several successful companies that compete amongst the ranks of EA, such as Rockstar, North, Konami, Ubisoft, and Nintendo. The video game industry has remained the fastest growing segment of the overall entertainment industry, and has shown the promise to continue growing further in the future. According to expert analyst reports, the industry is expected to grow 12%, and games purchases in the U.S. are forecasted to increase from $7.8 billion in 2004 to $12.5 billion in 2010. These forecasts are predominantly due to the upcoming release of next generation gaming consoles, the XBox 360, Playstation 3 and Nintendo Wii.
One trend in the video games industry that has been noted in recent years is the shift in demographics of gamers. Its core segment no longer consists of primarily young males, rather females and older adults have engaged in the mass market of video games. In 2005, female gamers consisted of 40% of the gamer population, and almost 25% of gamers were now older than 40. Likewise, time spent playing video games has been increased to 23 hours a week, while television consumption sat at 18 hours per week. .
Another trend that seems to be growing rapidly in the video game industry is the rise of online video games. By 2004, there were over 80 million casual gamers worldwide, and they represented the vast majority of online video games. Online game playing was considered more a social activity than a solitary pursuit, as many players connected online with opponents both known and unknown. Most of these games were simple and free-to-play games, such as checkers, mah-jongg and bridge. There are several websites that offer casual gamers and medium to play on, such as EA's www.pogo.com, Yahoo's gaming sites and Zone.MSN.com.
Company Analysis.
EA SWOT Analysis: After through research on EA, the following strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats that EA face are explained below.