Nexon Reports Q4 2021 Earnings - North America Business Continues to Lose Money

Nexon reported their Q4 and full year 2021 earnings report earlier this week and while company wide revenues were largely flat year over year at $2.37B USD, the North American business continued to lose money. The division reported $29.5M in revenue and a loss of $6.8M. The division has been reporting yearly losses for over a decade.

The vast majority of Nexon's revenues and profits are from Asia (South Korea and China), but the company has been investing heavily in their Western business with the acquisition of several gaming studios, but so far these acquisitions haven't yielded any profits (Nexon acquired Pixelberry Studios in 2017 and Big Huge Games in 2016).

The vast majority of Nexon's revenue in the West is from mobile games. The North American and European businesses combined reported ~$12m in PC gaming revenue which was likely dominated MapleStory. The only PC games Nexon has in the West are KartRider: Drift (unreleased), MapleStory, Mabinogi, Vindictus, Dungeon Fighter Online, and Counter-Strike Nexon Zombies. Given the tiny playerbase of all of these games in the West (with the exception of MapleStory), I suspect over 80% of Nexon's PC revenues in the West are from MapleStory.

On the positive side, Nexon's pipeline of games does look interesting with 12 games currently in development. I'm most excited about Project Mod, Nexon's Roblox competitor (an online game with a focus on user generated content).

Further Reading: Nexon Q4 2021 Earnings Presentation