Angry Birds maker happy as stay-at-home gaming boosts profit

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HELSINKI – Rovio Entertainment, maker of the 10-year-old “Angry Birds” mobile game series, on Friday reported a 160% jump in second-quarter adjusted operating profit, helped by increased player engagement amid COVID-19 lockdowns.

“We reached record high games revenue driven by the strong performance of our key games,” CEO Kati Levoranta said in a statement.

Adjusted operating profit rose to 13.8 million euros from 5.3 million while revenue fell 3.6% to 69.2 million euros due to lower movie revenue, said the Finnish company, which listed its shares in 2017.

The company attributed the improved performance to “increased player engagement due to COVID-19” as well as lower marketing costs.

“The overall impact of COVID-19, which was visible in a higher level of downloads, daily active users and player engagement, peaked in late April,” Levoranta said.

In August 2019, Rovio released a sequel to its successful Angry Birds movie but its movie revenue declined in the second quarter of 2020.

However, Rovio said “Angry Birds Movie 2” was among the most watched movies on Netflix during the spring.

($1 = 0.8463 euros)

(Reporting by Anne Kauranen; editing by Jason Neely)