Ziff Davis Shows Reduced Profit, Online Improvement

Game and technology magazine/website company Ziff Davis Media Inc., which owns three major North American-distributed game magazines (Electronic Gaming Monthly, Computer Gaming World and Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine) alongside major game website 1UP.com, reported reduced profits in its third quarter ended September 30, 2005. The Company's revenues totaled $41.8 million, representing a 10% decrease compared to revenues of $46.2 million for the third quarter ended September 30, 2004, and Ziff Davis showed a profit of $1.5 million for the quarter, representing a 77% decrease compared to a $6.5 million profit the previous year. According to the firm: "The majority of this decline was specifically related to the net decrease in the Company's print advertising revenues for the third quarter of 2005." Revenues for the Game Group, one of the three main Ziff Davis divisions, was $9.1 million, down $2.1 million or 19% compared to $11.2 million in the same period last year, partly due to the discontinuation of GMR magazine and current discontinuation of Xbox Nation magazine, but also on a decline in newsstand and other single copy magazine sales, primarily for Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine. Thus, the division lost $0.8 million for the quarter, but noted that 1UP.com's traffic more than doubled to over 2 million monthly unique visitors, leaving hope for further online growth. The company has recently been purchasing online properties such as FileFront.com and GameTab.com to help bolster its Internet presence. Robert F. Callahan, Chairman & CEO, Ziff Davis Holdings Inc commented of the results: "Our third quarter results continue to reflect the challenging print advertising market, where we have experienced significant decreases recently after having been stable and even increasing pages for our publications earlier this year. The encouraging news is that despite these tough current conditions, we are solidly profitable across our print operations and we are seeing strong growth for our online, events and custom solutions products, where we invested heavily over the last several quarters."