By Enrico Sciacovelli and Olivier Cherfan
(Reuters) -French video game producer Ubisoft on Thursday confirmed its guidance for the current financial year, as the company expressed confidence in its line-up after it beat its net booking estimate for the second quarter.
The maker of the blockbuster "Rainbow Six" franchise reported net bookings of 554.8 million euros ($584.09 million)for the three months to September 30, well above its target of 350 million euros.
"Activity was mostly driven by the performance of our back-catalog" co-founder and chief executive Yves Guillemot said in a statement, with added sales momentum from The Crew Motorfest and pre-shipments of Assassin's Creed Mirage.
Ubisoft, which has been dogged by game cancellations and delays, reiterated its forecast of a full-year non-IFRS operating income around 400 million euros, without releasing the other large game it had initially planned to launch during the last quarter of the current fiscal year.
For the third quarter, the company expects net bookings of around 610 million euros.
Ubisoft's total headcount dropped to 19,410 employees as of September 30, down from just under 20,000 reported in May, as the company said it was "well on track" with a cost-cutting plan initially announced in January.
The group reported operating income of 16.1 million euros for the six months to end September, after a loss of 215.3 million euros in the same period last year.
Ubisoft's remaining 2023-24 line-up of games will include the long-delayed Skull & Bones and Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, alongside free-to-play titles such as Rainbow Six Mobile and The Division Resurgence.
($1 = 0.9498 euros)
(Reporting by Enrico Sciacovelli and Olivier Cherfan, editing Jane Merriman)
