EA Gets It: It's About the Customer Edition
While most publishers' direct customer knowledge is limited to the names of the few customers who register the games on line, or log into a website for previews, EA is truly getting to know their customer – and everyone else’s. They have been tracking on-line play of their own games better than any other publisher for a while. Now with the acquisition of Rupture, they are on course to capture, understand and exploit the game habits of other publishers' consumers. EA's history points to how nicely Rupture fits into the strategy. The company was the last hold out from Xbox Live. While the other publishers were jumping on, EA was objecting to Mirosoft's central control business model. Then CFO, Warren Jenson, went on record saying it just didn't make sense. Sony had the opportunity to leverage the discord into a relationship which would define the on line nature of the next gen platforms, but held true to its laisse a faire position. Eighteen months after the l...