Atari reckon the Jaguar is going to put them back on the
road to profitability. Well, something's going to have to as
their performance is hardly outstandingly good.
Since the period was widely acknowledged at Atari to be a time of restructuring and changing their main focus from computers to consoles – although they still remain adamant that they haven’t completely pulled out of the computer market the sight of any positive action towards the computer industry is a rare one – this wasn’t much of a surprise.
Sam Tramiel expects Atari to remain unprofitable
for some time to come. Bearing in mind that the
Jaguar sells for a very low price with three
year's worth of development costs that might be
quite considerable
Sam Tramiel commented: “While we are disappointed in the magnitude of our losses in the fourth quarter and in 1993 as a whole, we believe that we have substantially completed our transition from our older technology products and the consolidation of our worldwide operations.
“As a result of increased spending for marketing activities and until such times as shipments of Jaguar products are made in substantial volume, we do not expect to achieve profitability.”
Atari have also sold more shares to Time Warner, taking Time Warner’s interest in the company up from 25% to 27%. Tramiel explained that the money made from this sale would be used to expand the Jag through the US.
They are quite obviously expecting sales of the Jaguar to bring the company back into credit – and if they don’t then it’s very likely to be the end of Atari. However, their stock market price continues to increase with Time Warner’s continued investment, it looks as if there is still sufficient confidence in the company to ensure it stays around for some years to come.
“We believe we have
completed our
transition from older
technology products”
The details of Atari's financial reports for the fourth quarter and for the year ending 31 December 1993 are as follows, Net sales for the fourth quarter 1993, were $8.5 million compared to $25.5 million for the same period in 1992. For the fourth quarter, 1993, Atari incurred a net loss of $22.6 million compared to $21.9 million in the same quarter 1992. For 1993 sales value is $28.8 million compared to $127.3 million in 1992. For 1993, Atari incurred a loss of $48.9 million compared to $73.6 million in 1992.
