Japanese Gaming Company DeNA Sees 136 Percent Jump In Profit And Record Revenue

Japanese gaming company DeNA reported strong fourth quarter and 2009 yearly results today, thanks to the recent growth of social gaming in Japan. For the fiscal fourth quarter, DeNA reported revenues of $205 million, an increase of 81% compared to fourth quarter of 2008. Operating income increased by 136% to $105 million from the fourth quarter of 2008. For fiscal 2009, DeNA reported revenues of $517 million, an increase of 28% compared to fiscal 2008. Operating income for the year increased by 34% to $228 million from fiscal 2008. Both fourth quarter and annual revenues as well as operating profits are record highs for DeNA.

DeNA launched in 1999 as an e-commerce company, and more recently moved towards the social gaming space, now developing in-house social games. The company has launched social game titles like Pirate Treasure, Hoshi-tsuku and Kaito Royale. DeNA has also licensed its games to mobile social networks, which Contributed to the revenue increase. And DeNA’s mobile gaming platform Moba-ge-tow has over 18 million registered members.

This week, DeNA also announced a strategic partnership with Yahoo Japan with plans to launch a PC-based social gaming platform, called Yahoo Mobage, later this year.

And the company, which already owns an equity stake in gaming company Aurora Feint and is getting serious about expanding into the U.S. DeNA plans to launch a social gaming platform in a number of English-speaking countries, and develop games for Facebook and other social networks.

These strong revenue and top line numbers from DeNA seems to reinforce the strength of the Japanese gaming market. Earlier this week, VentureBeat reported that social gaming giant Zynga was going to break into the Japanese market with an alliance with Japan’s Softbank investment firm.