Pour une poignée de dollars

Dans un communiqué de presse daté du 27 juin, Funcom annonce avoir sécurisé 30 millions de dollars supplémentaires en prévision du lancement de Age of Conan, dont la date est pour le moment établie au 30 octobre 2007.

L'origine de ces fonds privés n'a pas été précisée.

Voici le communiqué en question.

Funcom secures additional funding of approx. 30 million USD

- Additional funding fuels Funcom's 'Age of Conan' launch -

Durham, USA - June 27th, 2007 - On the back of significantly growing external and internal expectations related to 'Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures' -- Funcom's highly anticipated Massively Multiplayer Online Game (MMO) -- Funcom yesterday completed a private placement and through this received additional funding of approximately 30 million USD.

"We're expecting the launch of 'Age of Conan' to create significant waves in the MMO gamespace," says Funcom CEO Trond Arne Aas. "With the secured additional funding Funcom is in an even better position to make the launch of the game a success. This commitment from the financial market is reflecting the great promise and expectations for 'Age of Conan'."

'Age of Conan' is progressing according to plan towards the announced launch date of 30th October 2007. The game has recently received strong early sales indications from partners and retail channels both in the U.S. and in Europe and press and gamer expectations for 'Age of Conan' continue to grow strongly. To ensure an optimal launch of 'Age of Conan', Funcom and its key partners has through this round of funding strengthened Funcom's marketing and operational capacity prior to launch.

Funcom has furthermore decided to enter the casual MMO segment and is currently evaluating several possible expansion opportunities. As some of these opportunities may involve near term acquisitions, Funcom would also benefit from an increased strategic flexibility.

'Age of Conan' is consistently listed as one of the most anticipated PC games of 2007, and won 'Best MMO of E3' awards from IGN, GameSpot, GameSpy and Yahoo. 'Age of Conan' is a key title in Microsoft's Games for Windows line-up, as well as being a showcase DirectX 10 title for nVidia. More information about the game can be found online at http://www.ageofconan.com.