After having seduced the children, Roblox wants to conquer Wall Street.
This American platform, which allows you to simply create video games and play those of other users, has published its IPO document.
It contains valuable information about this company which attracts 31 million young people every day, and which has earned more than half a billion dollars since the start of 2020.
Read also: Roblox, the very lucrative video game you have never heard of
According to Reuters, Roblox hopes to reach a valuation of 8 billion dollars with this IPO.
This valuation is close to that of Ubisoft (10 billion dollars), or the price paid by Microsoft to buy the publisher ZeniMax (7.5 billion dollars).
Roblox has raised $ 335 million since its inception in 2006.
Roblox is a collaborative platform.
The company provides its users with tools to create very simple video games, without the need for programming knowledge.
Roblox has 7 million active creators, who have uploaded 18 million experiences.
These games are mostly mediocre and with little copyright respect, with copies of
Minecraft
and
Pokémon
.
But some stand out and are played by millions of children.
Because Roblox also allows you to draw for free from this catalog of games created by the community - this is even its main attraction.
More than half of the players are under 12 years old
According to the stock document, Roblox has 31 million players every day in 180 countries, a jump of 82% in one year.
The platform has indeed greatly benefited from the containment measures linked to the Covid-19 pandemic.
A quarter of players are under 9 years old, and 29% are between 9 and 12 years old.
A third is based in North America, but the company is also well established in Europe: 29% of users come from the Old Continent.
Roblox attracts as many girls as boys, and these kids play overwhelmingly on their phones (72%), far ahead of computers (25%) and consoles (3%).
The child must create an avatar, which will be his character in all the games he will explore.
To personalize it, you have to pay.
Some games also contain optional purchases.
This is how American society makes money, and shares it with its most popular creators.
Just over a thousand collected more than $ 10,000, 250 exceeded $ 1 million, and 3 creators made more than $ 10 million.
The company boasts that it has donated nearly $ 250 million to its community since its inception.
This remains a drop in the face of its turnover.
Partnership with brands
Between January and September, Roblox raked in $ 589 million, up 90% in one year.
Here again, the Covid-19 effect has played a role.
But the company is not profitable, and even widens its losses.
During this period, it lost 206 million dollars, against 46 million in deficit the previous year.
“
We have always lost money and we may never achieve profitability,
” Roblox notes in its IPO document.
The company is finding ways to develop its turnover.
It has invested in improving its creative tools in order to offer games with a graphic aspect that are more in line with the expectations of an audience of adolescents and young adults.
The company wants to accelerate internationally, and is studying a partnership with Tencent to enter the Chinese market.
She finally hopes to work with big brands who want to do marketing operations on the platform.
Last year, Roblox and Disney had entered into such a partnership for the theatrical release of the last episode of
Star Wars
.
Read also: Roblox sets out to conquer young Europeans
Among the risk factors listed by Roblox is “
the need to maintain a safe digital environment for children.
The company has already been pinned down by parents furious to see their offspring being approached by pedophiles, being subjected to virtual sexual violence, or being exposed to vulgar and offensive remarks in the discussion tools integrated into the platform.
