APRIL 28, 2009 • Having lost the Chinese World of Warcraft contract to Netease, The9 Ltd. has decided to compete with a new MMO of its own design: World of Fight. A temporary web site announcing the new MMO went live at www.wofchina.com. Other Chinese publishers in the past have launched domestic games similar to foreign titles they have lost the rights to.
Impact: Individual Chinese games can be very profitable, but only if an operator can keep the rights to the product. The9 generated about $250 million from online games in 2008. Most of this was due to World of Warcraft. Surprisingly the market seems somewhat bullish on The9’s prospects even without WoW. In early June The9’s stock (ADR:NTCY) was trading at around $11. This was down from a July 2008 high of over $28, but not the complete collapse one might expect from losing such an important product.
