Frontier profits roar ahead 550% even before Jurassic World launch

Video game developer Frontier Developments reported a big ramp up to record profits in its trading year as the firm completed its transition into a director-to-consumer publisher.

Frontier's operating profit of £7.8m was up 550% year on year, 97% of which came from its self-published titles and also a swelling of the operating margin to 21% from 6% a year earlier.

What's more revenues climbed 75% to £37.4m thanks to the launch of its second self-published video game, Planet Coaster, and a continued strong interest from its 2014 title, Elite Dangerous.

Earnings per share rocketed 440% over the year to 22.7p and cash balances were up 47% to a produce net cash of £12.6m.

The Cambridge based business announced its next major franchise title, Jurassic World Evolution, would be released in conjunction with the next film in the highly successful and long running movie franchise, based on the novels of Michael Crichton, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, in the summer of 2018.

Frontier raised £17.7m in July through a strategic investment by Chinese interactive entertainment company Tencent, fuelling its growth into the key Asian market and assisting in driving scale-up of the group.

Chief executive and founder David Braben said, "We believe that developing our business to achieve repeatable success requires scale. We are continuing to grow our capability and over time we aim to double our output, from roughly one major launch every two years, to one every 12 months or so."

As of 0830 BST, shares moved ahead 4.02% to 1,165.00p.