As confirmed by The9, the company is now conducting a negotiation with Blizzard Entertainment to renew license of World of Warcraft.

The result of the negotiation is critical to The9, since WoW took 90% of the company's revenue. As pointed out by Zhao Chuming, analyst of SOG, the number of WoW kept growing in the first quarter, while other games not yet became the growth drive of The9.

Chen Xiaowei, new president of The9 told the press yesterday that The9 was now discussing with Blizzard on the continuing the licensing of WoW. With the latest announcement of Wrath Of The Lich King and the long-term cooperation with Blizzard, The9 will try its best to speed up the negotiation . But so far, there is no specific time schedule announced yet.

As one resource closed to Zhu Jun revealed, The9 was very confident to get the deal. The9 has rich   expericence in the operation of WoW in China for many years. Besides the success in licensing two expansions, the growing number of subscribers of WoW in China makes The9 hard to exceed.