LINE Corporation, owner and operator of the free call and messaging app LINE, today announced their Q2 (April – June) earnings for 2014.
LINE Corporation’s revenue *1, 2 for the quarter was JPY 21.2 billion, an increase of 17.5% over the previous quarter.
The revenue for LINE Corporation’s core business, LINE, totaled JPY 18.2 billion in the first quarter, a 25% increase over the previous quarter and a 146% increase over the same quarter in the previous year.
User numbers have continued to increase, with firm growth seen in the user bases of Southeast Asian countries, including Indonesia. In addition, LINE’s platform-based strategy has been successful in Mexico, Colombia, and other Central and South American countries, leading to even further increases in new user numbers and an overall expansion in worldwide use.
The sticker business has witnessed the rapid growth of LINE Creators Market, a platform launched in April that allows users to purchase and sell stickers made by users themselves, as a new and unique platform for the smartphone age. LINE Creators Market, by providing a space in which users and creative artists can reach a global audience, as well as sell and purchase self-made stickers, has made it possible for the diverse needs of both users and creative artists to be met. Furthermore, the release of LINE Creators Market has also increased the pace of sticker localization efforts within LINE’s global expansion. This has resulted in over JPY 150 million in total sales from LINE Creators Market in the first month after stickers were made available for sale and purchase on May 8. Sales of paid stickers have also continued to excel, reaching an all new high for monthly sales since the release of the LINE Creators Market service, and particularly strong sales of animated stickers, launched in June, have driven overall revenue up.
In terms of the game business, along with the continued success enjoyed by LINE: Disney TsumTsum as it expanded service in Western and East Asian markets in July, TV commercials for LINE Cookie Run and LINE Rangers were shown in Asian countries like Japan, Taiwan, and Thailand, and offline promotional events for games were held, which all contributed to increases in user numbers and revenue. LINE has also continued to support localization efforts, creating games tailored to specific cultures and market conditions, such as its “LINE I am Wukung” game and more. LINE aims to fur
ther accelerate the growth of user numbers and revenue derived from abroad through localization schemes matched to each country’s market.
The advertising business has continued to grow, enjoying increased adoption of the Official Account and Sponsored Sticker services in all countries. Corporate adoption of the LINE Business Connect service, announced in February, has steadily increased as well, and through a partnership finalized in June with Salesforce.com, the world’s largest scale CRM software vendor, LINE aims to further expand upon corporate utilization of the LINE Business Connect service by lightening the development burden placed on companies.
Comment from LINE Corporation CEO Akira Morikawa:
Since the beginning of 2014, globally active Asian companies have increased their presence in the messaging service market. Amid such fierce competition, LINE, as a global corporation, has continued to grow firmly not only in terms of user base but on the revenue side as well, and was even selected as the Global Growth Company of 2014 at the World Economic Forum.
LINE will continue its efforts to surpass the bounds of a messaging service in order to become an infrastructure for communications, and aims to become the leading force in the global market as a mobile platform.
