SAN FRANCISCO, CA--(Marketwire - May 28, 2010) - Today, CyberAgent America, Inc. announced that its virtual community Ameba Pico reached 1 million users after launching less than three months ago. Since its debut on March 8, the Ameba Pico Facebook app has been downloaded more than 1.2 million times, with slightly more than 1 million users creating Pico characters and actively playing the game, which combines gaming, social networking and virtual goods tightly integrated into the Facebook environment.
Along with the influx in users, Ameba Pico has also seen large, steady growth in revenue from in-game micro-transactions over the last three months. From March to April, Pico experienced 140 percent revenue growth, and 160 percent growth from April to May.
Ameba Pico allows users to create custom avatars and explore more than 20 different virtual scenes from around the globe and through time, as well as visit storefronts selling virtual goods, and the "World Community Park" where users can gather and chat in English, Spanish, French, Japanese, Chinese, Thai, Tagalog and Bahasa. Ameba Pico also aims to bridge the gap between the anonymity of virtual worlds and social network profiles by allowing users to click through to the Facebook profiles of the users they interact with in the community.
"Ameba Pico has quickly proved itself to be a fun, interactive and safe community for our users to meet up and have fun," said Toshimichi Namba, president and CEO of CyberAgent America, Inc. "We've created an addictive gaming environment with lots of incentive to our users to come back. From virtual goods, to the ever-changing Pico worlds, games and tight integration in to our users' social graphs, we created an experience that appeals to people."
Ameba Pico is the first English language offering from CyberAgent America, Tokyo-based CyberAgent's newly formed subsidiary, and is based on Ameba Pigg, one of the most popular and successful virtual worlds in Japan. In the Japanese market, Ameba Pigg attracted millions of users in its first year and now generates seven-figure revenues per month due to strong virtual currency transactions.
About CyberAgent America, Inc.
CyberAgent America, Inc. was established in February 2008 as a fully owned subsidiary of Tokyo-based CyberAgent. With our extensive networks and over 10 years of experience in the Japanese internet industry, CyberAgent America is in a position to forge Japanese internet services in to American market, taking advantage of synergies between the CyberAgent group.
Contact Information:
Press Contacts:
Corey Lewis or Jason Throckmorton
LaunchSquad
(415) 625-8555
pico(at)launchsquad(dot)com