JoWood only had it for a limited amount of time which allowed them to release Gothic 3: The Beginning and Arcania – Gothic 4 without involvement from Piranha Bytes, despite those being pissed off at JoWood and cutting their ties after being forced to release Gothic 3 early and in an unfinished state.

It's been rather surprising they've been managed to stay afloat this long. None of their games has really set the world on fire and they have always done surprisingly big games.

Studio size. Elex was done with less than 30 people. You can be a lot more profitable if you don't bloat yourself up like other studios do.