EA predicts $6 billion in sales by 2011

Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello is confident the company's revenue will jump significantly on the back of new properties and the overhaul of existing franchises. At an analysts' meeting yesterday, Riccitiello set a revenue goal of $6 billion for the company in fiscal 2011, with at least $900 million coming from digital revenue streams like downloadable content, subscription fees, and in-game advertising. That represents a growth of 71 percent over its 2008 fiscal year revenue, which it expects to hit roughly $3.5 billion.

To help it achieve that goal, EA is banking on the growth of existing franchises including Need for Speed, The Sims, Burnout, and Madden NFL. Equally important to the plan is the publisher's recently created or acquired intellectual property such as Skate and BioWare's Mass Effect.

Some of the steps the publisher is taking were revealed elsewhere in the company's daylong analyst conference. Burnout and Skate games are getting new releases by April 2009, and The Sims franchise will continue to expand. The publisher announced MySims Kingdom and MySims Party for the Nintendo Wii and DS, expected in the fiscal 2009 third quarter (this coming October through December) and fourth quarter (next January through March), respectively. In addition, MySims for PC is due during the holiday season, and SimCity Creator and Sim Animals have also been named.

Other new announcements made by EA yesterday included a release date of September 7 for Spore (and possible PS3 and Xbox 360 versions), Mass Effect coming to PCs and the reinking of its NFL licence until 2012.

EA's shares jumped more than 5 percent to close the day at $48.85 on the back of its analyst meeting.