Rovio revenue estimate 2014

Is there a correlation between Rovio's revenue and the amount of Google searches for their most popular title Angry Birds? Admittedly, we only have three data points to go on, but they do line up nicely. The upper chart plots the log change in search volume (x-axis) against revenue (y-axis). Based on that correlation, Rovio's revenue should decline somewhat in 2014, to 152 million €.

Supercell revenue 2014 is 1.55 billion €, compared to forecasted 1.7 billion €

How powerful is Google Trends for predicting revenue of Internet compaines? This is just one data point, but my previous prediction for Supercell's 2014 revenue was not far off.

Supercell's revenue for 2014 was 1.55 billion €, compared to my prediction of 1.7 billion €.



The next prediction I have my eye on is for the Apple Watch. Google Trends data suggests that the Apple Watch will sell well below what market analysts expect. While the launch of the Apple Watch did create some buzz on search engines, that quickly died out.

Another mobile games company from Finland is Rovio. If would be interesting to see if the correlation holds up for them as well. It's not looking good.

Apple Watch sales prediction based on Google Trends data

Back in September 2014, I estimated that the unit sales of the Apple Watch will be 2700 000 in the first three months of sales. The number is based on the correlation between Google searches around the announcement for the iPhone and iPad. Later on in October I revised the number down to 400 000 based on low interest for the product.

When compared to the interest in the iPhone and iPad, the Apple Watch is still lagging behind. In fact, the iPod generates more Google Searches than the Apple Watch.

Industry analysts expect Apple to sell between 10-30 million watches in the first year, or 4-7.5 million per quarter. Even if 400 000 is way too low, the low search interest for the watch indicates that sales will be lower than what analysts predict.

Google Trends data is always two days behind, so we will have to wait until Wednesday to see how the Apple Watch launch compares to the iPad and iPhone. So far, it doesn't look great.

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