Nintendo posts $569mn Q3 profit on the back of Pokemon Go sales

Nintendo, the Japanese gaming company, is now churning profits from its popular augmented reality game Pokemon Go, released last year. Beating analyst’s expectation, Nintendo has reported a $569 million profit on revenue of $1.5 billion for the third fiscal quarter ended December 31.

For its annual financial report, which is due in May, Nintendo raised its full-year forecast to $791 million from $440 million which marks more than five-fold increase from what it earned the previous fiscal year. However, revenue was down 22 percent year-on-year.

The Kyoto-based firm also earned a combined 14.69 million in sales from its Pokemon Sun and Pokemon Moon titles for the 3DS. Also, its Super Mario Maker for Nintendo 3DS surpassed the million-seller mark, because of which Nintendo reported 6.45 million in 3DS sales, up 10 percent year-on-year.

However, for its Wii U Console game, the company sold only 760,000 units which is 75 percent down from a year earlier. Nintendo was aiming to ship 800,000 million units this fiscal year. Software sales of Wii U games were 12.48 million units, during the nine months, down 45 percent.

Because of these figures, the company is planning to replace the Wii U with the Switch, a hybrid home console and portable device that will go on sale on March 3.

On the smartphone front, the company Launched Super Mario Run for iOS in December. Within first four days of the launch, Nintendo boxed up a record 40 million downloads. The game is expected to arrive on Android smartphone in March.

The company is planning to release more games this year- more titles for the 3DS, including Mario Sports Superstars, and on smartphones, it will release Fire Emblem Heroes on February 2, which will reach Android users first. However, Nintendo has delayed the release of Animal Crossing until the next fiscal year.