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Its Official, Midway Exits Coinop Industry
With many rumours circulating the industry, it became official today that Midway will exit the coinop industry in order to focus its business exclusively on games for the rapidly growing home video-game market.
The Chicago-based company said it made its decision based on the "ongoing declining demand in the coin-operated arcade video game market."
Midway said its game development efforts will now be focused on games for home game platforms, such as PlayStation2 (6758), the Xbox system from Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) and Nintendo Co. Ltd.'s (7974) GameCube and Game Boy Advance.
Midway said it expects the elimination of its coin-operated games business to result the layoff of fewer than 60 employees, as well as a primarily non-cash, pre-tax charge of less than $8 million in the quarter ending June 30.
The company had previously said it expects the home video-game market to generate significant demand for game software over the next several years. As a result, Midway said it expects to generate significant revenue and profit growth in fiscal 2002.
We have been very close with Midway over the last few years, working closely with development and sales staff who all were highly professional and motivated people. The same cannot be said to top management who never really grasped what the industry needed or wanted. The marketing, promotion and development of markets was often mishandled and products were destroyed before really giving them a chance.
We feel sorry to see (and have seen) many of our friends at Midway leave the industry and we wish all of them the best of luck.
A very sad day for our industry.
SOURCE: Reuters.
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