4 of 6 BoD seats are already in the hand of investors and a VC, that ratio would probably not change substantially post-IPO.

I don't really understand how 3rd party GTC transactions work, I know there are sites that sell them, but how do they aquire them and whats in it for them?

Lets make this as blunt as possible.


66 million in revenue is peanuts.

It really is.

EvE, in itself, is profitable and self sustaining. However EvE is not CCP's only project. If you ever took a look at CCP's basic financials from 2010, it's plainly obvious that the only way CCP can continue to develop Dust 514 and WoD is by using external financing.

They need cash.

I buy my GTC's only from the CCP website. I know some others sell them though, can't imagine what's in it for them.

Yeah, its about right. The thing that worries me most is the possibility (likelihood?) of Dust 514 failing and the capitalized costs of WOD with all its devs layed off/repurposed. I really wish we'd heard about this in a dev blog first... they could spin it way better.

For now, I have fun in Eve. If it goes IPO and the investors kill my game... well I'll find a new one. Or maybe make one, who knows?

Oh, how wrong you are

EA would do more harm in 18 days than the 18 month development freeze caused.

I hope Eve doesn't go public in any form. I want Eve and CCP to be stable for decades, and if they're exposed to outside market influences this vision could be disturbed. CCP has proven they've been able to handily avoid outside events even as Iceland was practically collapsing around them during the financial crisis. Well credit tightening probably led to the recent layoffs, but that didn't really affect the core employees or IP (eve),

I want to know more about the Asian expansion...

Also <3 CCP keep up the awesome work! So proud to have been with you since the early days \o/

/c

Lol, I don't think you understand how finances work. If CCP kept all the CCP stock then they would raise no cash. I don't think EA could do any worse than completely ignoring EVE development for at least 18 months, I wish we had EA service for those 18 months.

That's a lot of Hookers, Blow and Lutefisk.

But, going public brings with it great responsibility and CCP in my opinion is not ready yet to answer to real shareholders.

It's been shown in the past that some VERY rich people play EVE. And were shoveling money into GTC sales that shifted balance of power so much that for a time it looked like one alliance might have been able to "win" EVE.

http://techcrunch.com/2012/02/21/eve-online-saw-66m-in-revenue-last-year-mulls-ipo/

CCP Games, the makers of the massively multiplayer online role-playing game EVE Online , say the company brought in $66 million in revenue last year.

The game, a science fictional adventure set in a star cluster dominated by five major civilizations, first launched in 2003, and its subscriber base (currently about 400,000) has grown every year since launch. Revenue has been growing too, at a compound annual growth rate of 53 percent, bringing in total revenue of $300 million over the gameGÇÖs lifetime. As for profits, CCP would only say that it has GÇ£very healthy marginsGÇ¥ GÇö a claim backed up by the fact that it has grown to more than 450 employees despite only raising $3 million in seed funding.

This might seem like an illustration that traditional online gaming, overshadowed in the media by casual social games like those from Zynga, can still work as a business model. At the same time, CCPGÇÖs new CMO David Reid says the company has been excited to embrace new models, in addition to the traditional subscriptions offered by EVE.

CCP has already been experimenting with free-to-play in EVE, by allowing rich subscribers to essentially pay for others to play, in exchange for virtual currency GÇö something that has been used by 40,000 people, the company says. Its next game, DUST 451, is scheduled for release this summer, and will go further in this direction, charging players for in-game credits rather than subscriptions or playing time (though there is an initial GÇ£cover chargeGÇ¥).

ThatGÇÖs not the only ambitious thing about DUST. With its first-person shooter gameplay, this is CCPGÇÖs attempt to reach the audience that made franchises like Call of Duty a hit, while also connecting to the EVE universe. Through mechanisms like orbital bombardment, the space-based players in EVE can actually affect the planet-based combat in DUST, and vice versa.

As a result of its plans for DUST, as well as Asian expansion for EVE, CCP says 2012 will be its bigger year yet. In fact, the Icelandic companyGÇÖs CEO Hilmar Veigar Petursson says an IPO is a possibility, though predictably, he wouldnGÇÖt commit to anything.

GÇ£We want to be ready for an IPO from a policy standpoint,GÇ¥ Petursson says. GÇ£WeGÇÖre quite a substantial company, so weGÇÖre thinking, GÇÿOkay, what is the next step?GÇÖGÇ¥