The return of Mark Pincus: His impact on social gaming giant Zynga after 100 days

In his first full quarter back at the helm of Zynga, Mark Pincus delivered a solid financial result. The social gaming company that he founded still has a long way to go before its long-awaited turnaround is complete. It has fierce rivals in mobile games, where it is still playing catch-up. Zynga’s player numbers are still dropping as web games crater and the company loses some players in its relaunched Words With Friends mobile game. And Zynga is still losing a small amount of money: $7.6 million in the earnings reported yesterday.

But Pincus also delivered a positive surprise to Wall Street, beating both bookings and earnings estimates in the second quarter. Social casino games such as Wizard of Oz Slots and Hit It Rich! Slots grew 274 percent from a year earlier, and the newly launched Empires & Allies is monetizing three times better than the average Zynga game. Advertising is now 22 percent of total revenue, compared to 15 percent a year ago. And Pincus recruited former EA executive Frank Gibeau to join Zynga’s board of directors. Pincus talked about these developments in an interview with GamesBeat on Thursday.