Games drive strong earnings for Angry Birds maker Rovio

The folks at Rovio Entertainment reported their earnings for the first quarter of the company's fiscal year this week, and the numbers look good -- thanks primarily to the company's game business.  

The house that Angry Birds built claims profits (aka earnings before taxes and interest) of 5.2 million Euro (~$5.68 million USD at current exchange rates) on 66.3 million Euro ($72.45 million) in revenues brought in during the first quarter of its 2017 fiscal year.

That's quite a bit more (nearly 5x as more) than the 0.9 million Euro ($983,565) in profits it reportedly earned during the same quarter a year ago, and it's all chalked up to the company's Games business, where golden geese like Angry Birds 2 and Angry Birds Blast roost.

All together, Rovio's Games biz generated 8.8 million Euro ($9.61 million) in profit on 56.6 million Euro ($61.85 million) in revenue. That profit was counteracted by the company's Brand Licensing business (think: Angry Birds toys, hats, sweaters, etc.), which reported a loss of 700,000 Euro ($764,946) on 9.7 million Euro ($10.59 million) in revenue during the quarter.

However, Rovio CEO Kati Levoranta stated that "we also expect to see revenue growth in 2017 from the recognition of Angry Birds movie revenues, that will have a direct impact on the revenue of our Brand Licensing Unit." The film was released in theaters last May.