Japanese DeNA makes 30 times more ARPU than Facebook, 15 times more than Zynga

Japan’s DeNA, that runs Mobage-town social mobile portal in Japan, today announced its earnings and in order to hit listeners with its presence revealed some interesting comparisons.

But first some numbers:

DeNA’s Revenue for the quarter was $336 million, up 216 percent from the same quarter last year (Q2 2009). With such numbers DeNA is on pace to hit $1.25 billion by year’s end (Q1+Q2+Q3 2010), largely from revenue from virtual goods for its social mobile games.

Now the interesting comparisons:

DeNA claims that its average revenue per user (ARPU) is 30 times that of Facebook; and 15 times what Zynga gets from per user.

Sounds astonishing ? It shouldn’t. Mobile users in Japan are far ahead (courtesy, technological advancement too) of Western users when it comes to embracing the virtual goods free-to-play model. In the virtual goods free-to-play model, users play for free and pay small amounts of real money for virtual goods inside games. Facebook and Zynga who are quite successful in luring people to their networks; fared relatively less spectacularly on the virtual goods free-to-play model.

DeNA’s quite attacking comparisons are not for nothing; DeNA, is trying to move to the international stage in order to compete head-on with Facebook and Zynga. Only recently it agreed to acquire iPhone game publisher Ngmoco for $403 million as part of a bid to become global. --------

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