May 27 (Bloomberg) -- Ubisoft Entertainment SA, Europe’s biggest video-game publisher, will slow its hiring after bringing on 1,300 new employees last year, Chief Executive Officer Yves Guillemot said.

“We will continue to hire, but as we hired more than the plan last year, we will diminish the number of hires this year,” Guillemot, 48, who founded the company with his brothers in 1986, said in an interview.

Ubisoft, with more than 5,750 employees, is adding staff while Electronic Arts Inc. and THQ Inc. eliminate hundreds of jobs and close game studios. Ubisoft, maker of “Shawn White Snowboarding,” “Assassin’s Creed” and “Rayman Raving Rabbids,” plans to increase sales by 20 percent annually for several years, excluding currency effects, Guillemot said.

Ubisoft, based in the Paris suburb of Montreuil-sous-Bois, said last month sales in the fiscal year ended March 31 increased 14 percent to 1.06 billion euros ($1.47 billion).

This quarter, Ubisoft predicts sales will drop 44 percent to 95 million euros because of limited releases. For the year, sales will increase about 4 percent to 1.1 billion euros, with growth of 23 percent in the second half of the year following a 35 percent decline in the first half.

“Our goal is to grow on average 20 percent a year and there will be years that are at 30 percent and some that are 10 percent,” said Guillemot, who will be in Los Angeles next week for E3 Expo, the annual game industry trade show.

Sales have increased a total of 55 percent over the past two years.

Ubisoft rose 20 cents, or 1.4 percent, to close at 14.66 euros in Paris trading. The stock has gained 5.1 percent this year.

Annual Profit

Ubisoft’s net income in the year ended March 31 fell 37 percent to 68.8 million euros. Profit totaled 84.7 million excluding some non-recurring costs and stock-based compensation. That exceeded the 78.9 million euros estimate of 14 analysts compiled by Bloomberg.

The company exceeded its targets on hiring last year as a result of acquisitions and because more developers were available, Guillemot said. Electronic Arts, which owns 15 percent of Ubisoft, has cut 1,100 jobs to reduce costs. THQ has eliminated 600 positions.

Guillemot said 10 percent of Ubisoft’s workforce is working on developing games for the next generation of game systems that will eventually replace Nintendo Co.’s Wii, Microsoft Corp.’s Xbox 360 and Sony Corp.’s PlayStation 3.

Next Generation

“What has helped us is we always take the new technologies right at the beginning of their availability, and we go after them faster than everyone else,” he said. The company was one of the first to make titles exclusively for the Wii.

In the first three months of 2009, the company lost market share in the U.S. and Europe. Guillemot said sales will improve later this year when new games are released and when prices on the PlayStation 3 and Wii are reduced. Guillemot predicts industry growth of 5 percent to 10 percent this year.

One of Ubisoft’s most anticipated titles this year is “Avatar,” a game being released for the Christmas shopping season that is based on the James Cameron film that will be opening around the same time.

To contact the reporter on this story: Adam Satariano in San Francisco at asatariano1@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: May 27, 2009 12:24 EDT