WARTHOG SET TO
FLY IN GAMES MARKET
Copyright 2002 www.independent.co.uk
[ April 22nd 2002 ]
Warthog
is a start-up company in the computer games industry,
a sector that has been through a tremendous slump,
yet it has made money in every one of its five
years of existence. Now employing 200 people with
forecast revenues of 9.7m this year, the company,
based in Cheadle, Cheshire, is already one of
Britain's leading games developers and it won
an award for International Trade.
The business
started when Electronic Arts, a US games company,
closed its offices in the north west of England,
leaving six games developers out of a job. They
teamed up with Ashley Hall and Eric Elms, two
local businessmen who were looking to do something
different and the company was born in 1997 – taking
its name from a hunting trophy Mr Hall possessed.
The problems
of the UK's games industry have been very apparent
in recent years, with companies such as Eidos
struggling. However, Eidos is a publisher while
Warthog is in the business of actually creating
the games - and it went to the much better performing
US games publishers. Warthog got off to a flying
start. Its first offering, Starlancer was sold
to Microsoft. "That was a fantastic break," Mr
Hall said.
In its
first year, Warthog made £5,000 and this year,
having floated on the Alternative Investment Market
in January 2001, the company is forecast to make
a pre-tax profit of £1.1m. Some 85 per cent of
the company's work is for foreign companies, mostly
the big US games publishers.
With
three new games consoles on the market, from Sony,
Microsoft and Nintendo, there should be better
times ahead. "We're very much in the growth phase
now. We need one of the games we are currently
working on to be a big hit and that will truly
put us on the map," Mr Hall said.
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