Minecraft maker reports revenue of almost $140 million in 2012

Minecraft maker Mojang has reported revenue of $237.7 million for 2012, according to information passed on to GamesIndustry International by Thomas Arnroth, a Swedish author who has followed Mojang for a year for his book, A Year With Mojang: Minecraft Behind The Scenes.

Mojang is reported to have turned over SEK1.5 billion ($237.7m) in 2012, SEK640 million ($101.4m) of which came from licensing fees. Pre-tax profits were SEK580 million ($92m).

“It’s almost hard to grasp,” said Mojang CEO Carl Manneh. “It’s easy to become a bit blind working at Mojang. Everything’s happening so fast and it’s going so well. One almost needs to pinch oneself to know it’s for real.

“When we started Mojang in 2010 we made a budget for the first year. Three months later we just trashed it – it became totally irrelevant. We still have the same feeling now. There simply are no good ways to forecast how much money we are going to make.”

And the money doesn’t look likely to dry up anytime soon, with Mojang keen to tap into new markets.

“Minecraft is a power of its own now – it’s just rolling,” he said. “We have so many markets where we are not very strong yet, where many play Minecraft but few have bought it simply because you can’t use our online payment solution there. That’s something we’ll get our hands to during 2013.”

Only last month Mojang announced Minecraft had sold 20 million copies.

Source: GamesIndustry International