Phil Spencer, CEO of Microsoft’s gaming division, said the Xbox Game Pass subscription service is already profitable. Speaking at the WSJ Tech Live conference, Spencer also noted that Xbox Game Pass accounts for about 15% of Microsoft’s content and Xbox revenue. He now expects Xbox Game Pass revenue to stay at 10-15% percent, which will be very beneficial for the company.
That being said, Spencer suggests that Xbox Game Pass will not dominate Microsoft’s gaming revenue. There’s a reason for this – there aren’t many Xbox console owners left who can still sign up for this service.
“We are seeing incredible growth on PC. On consoles, I noticed a slowdown in growth, mainly because at some point you reach all console users who want to subscribe, ”explains Spencer.
Microsoft recently reported that PC Game Pass subscriptions increased by 159% year-over-year and that more than 20 million people use Xbox Cloud Gaming , up from 10 million at the beginning of this year. PC looks like an obvious growth area, but there are always mobile devices as well.
The company is building an Xbox mobile game store to compete with Apple and Google, but it will run into trouble expanding Xbox Game Pass on platforms like iOS where it is currently not possible to offer competing stores or even cloud gaming apps. Spencer acknowledged these issues, but believes that Microsoft is playing a long game with the Xbox mobile store.
“If you make the long-term bet that we’re making that we can access players on the biggest platforms people play on – Android phones and iOS phones – we want to be in position already with content, players and opportunities. store to seize the moment.
Pricing was another hot topic during Spencer’s Tech Live talk. While Microsoft hasn’t raised the price of Xbox Game Pass or the Xbox console, Spencer has hinted that changes are possible in the future.
“We kept the price of our console, we kept the price of the games and our subscription. I don’t think we can do this forever. I do think that at some point we will have to raise some prices on some things, but ahead of that, we thought it was very important to keep the prices we have.”
Украинский интерфейс Xbox: Microsoft добавила украинскую локализацию в новую альфа-версию прошивки
Source: The Verge