Do you remember Zynga? The gigantic social gaming company that couldn’t get it’s Facebook hits Farmville and Cityville to mobile fast enough? Yes the same company is now behind What’s The Phrase and Words With Friends oh yeah, and Draw Something. But none of those bets could help them on Wall Street, and Wednesday we found out things are even worse for a company that was once the crown jewel of Facebook gaming.
If there’s ever a lesson in not putting all your tech eggs in one basket it starts with a Z and ends in an A and has Yng in the middle.
Arstechnica reports that Zynga had an up quarter with daily active users increasing from 27 million to 28 million from the last quarter of 2013 to the end of the first quarter of 2014. That should be good news, and for some it may be, but that’s also down from 57 million active users in the same quarter in 2013, and even that was down from 65 million active users in the same quarter in 2012. That’s not the way the hockey stick growth thing is supposed to work.
Zynga’s founder Mark Pincus was ousted as CEO of the summer of 2013, and in their earnings call new CEO Don Mattrick reported that Pincus was leaving day to day operations of the company completely but would remain chairman of the board. After being ousted as CEO Pincus slid into the Chief Product Officer role.
Mattrick also announced that former Xbox Live head, Alex Garden was coming aboard to serve as Zynga’s new president. Mattrick seems optimistic that this will be a good year for the company.
“In Q1 our teams delivered a solid start to the year against our strategic frame of growing and sustaining our franchises, creating new hits and driving efficiencies. We have established a strong base for 2014 and believe we are pacing well for a year of growth,” said Don Mattrick, Zynga’s CEO, in a statement.