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PC digital downloads market to be worth $1bn in '09

Chart-Track estimates downloads to grow, but data specialists unable to include digital sales numbers

GfK Chart-Track director Dorian Bloch has said that he expects the market for digital downloads via services such as Steam, Direct2Drive and Metaboli to be worth over USD 1 billion in 2009.

Last year Bloch estimates that the market generated around USD 600 million, and he admitted publisher's using this market are desperate to include their sales number's in the company's data, which is relied on by the UK and European industry.

"This is a huge business," said Bloch, speaking at the Develop Conference in Brighton. "The key thing for me in this is that these publishers support me in what I do and they want their sales included in the charts."

However, he noted that without a wider selection of data from multiple publishers, GfK Chart-Track is unable to include the stats and give a clearer picture of digital sales in the videogames business.

"Sega has been asking us, 'when can we include our Football Manager sales in our charts?' We'd like to include them, but I can't just include one publisher's sales, I need a balanced approach for doing that," he said.

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Matt Martin

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Matt Martin joined GamesIndustry in 2006 and was made editor of the site in 2008. With over ten years experience in journalism, he has written for multiple trade, consumer, contract and business-to-business publications in the games, retail and technology sectors.