Lasky: EA "has destroyed" over $11bn market value, all "since JR"

[vaio]

Lasky: EA "has destroyed" over $11bn market value, all "since JR"

 

Ex-EA man Mitch Lasky has blogged a damning piece of EA's haemorrhaging of market value over these last few years, noting $11bn is gone.

Lasky says it's "amazing" the EA board continues to back "existing management", pointing the finger at reins-holder CEO John Riccitiello.

"It's been a very ugly scene, indeed. From Spore, to Dead Space, to Mirror's Edge, to Need for Speed: Undercover, it's been one expensive commercial disappointment for EA Games after another," blogs the ex-EA EVP Mitch Lasky, reports VG247.

"Not to mention the shut-down of Pandemic, half of the justification for EA's $850MM acquisition of BioWare-Pandemic. And don't think that Dante's Inferno, or Knights of the Old Republic, is going to make it all better. It's a bankrupt strategy."

"And don't believe this is the end of the bleeding. This latest stock drop, if consistent with the after-hours trading, will wipe out virtually all of the gain from 2009," he warns.

Lasky is shocked no one has tried to take over EA, to "put them out of their misery" with a big cut of a cheque and full acquisition. "Certainly, Disney has been looking at them since I was at the house of the mouse back in the early 90's. And there are Chinese companies, like TenCent, that could easily swallow EA whole."

"It's equally amazing that the board continues to support the existing management team through this debacle. Since JR took over, the company has destroyed over $11 billion in market value," he went on.

"Certainly, some of that was the economy and the general erosion of value on NASDAQ, but Activision has experienced far milder effects from the recession."

"It's remarkably hard to kill a company doing $4 billion in revenues. But with flat or down stock performance since Q3 2003, how long are the institutional investors going to continue to hope against hope for a turn-around?" It's an interesting read for sure.