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Forums - Sales Discussion - PS3 Shortages Possible, Eating into 360 sales says Analyst

PS3 Seeing Stronger Pent-Up Demand, Shortages Possible, says Analyst

Since Sony dropped the price on PS3 to $299, launched the new model PS3 Slim and kicked off an appealing new marketing campaign, sales have really picked up, both here (up 300% at top retailers) and overseas. In fact, according to Sterne Agee analyst Arvind Bhatia, PS3 hardware appears to be ahead of market expectations this month. 

"Our channel checks show that PS3 hardware sales remained strong in the second week of September following very strong sales in the first week of September. The first week of September saw a 300% lift at top retailers according to Sony. Our checks suggest stronger pent-up demand than expected. We now believe PS3 hardware sales in September have the potential to be up as much as 75% y-o-y versus our most recent upwardly revised expectation of +50% y-o-y. We believe this is stronger than market expectations," he said.

If Bhatia's right, some consumers could even have some difficulty finding the PS3 by the end of the month - a stark comparison to the post-launch months when PS3 boxes were sitting, collecting dust on store shelves. "We believe PS3 sales for the month of September could be up even more than our estimate of +75% depending on supply. Our contacts indicate that while PS3 supplies are currently normal there is risk of shortages by the end of this month," he said.

Not only is Sony gaining some steam going into the holiday season, but Bhatia indicated that PS3 sales do appear to be eating into Xbox 360 sales - music to Sony's ears no doubt.  "In contrast to the PS3, our checks show that hardware sales of Xbox 360 have shown only a slight lift of around 5% to 10% following its recent price cut. We attribute this to the fact that Microsoft’s lower priced Arcade model remained unchanged in price at $199 while the Elite model, while lowered by $100, really just replaced the Pro Model (which is being phased out) at $299. In addition, given our checks on the PS3, it does appear that the PS3 is picking up some share at the expense of the 360," he said.

We're going to be very curious to see what NPD's September figures show us next month. It's going to be an interesting battle this holiday for sure.

 

 

http://www.industrygamers.com/news/ps3-seeing-stronger-pent-up-demand-shortages-possible-says-analyst/



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MrNathanDrake said:

Bhatia indicated that PS3 sales do appear to be eating into Xbox 360 sales - music to Sony's ears no doubt.  "In contrast to the PS3, our checks show that hardware sales of Xbox 360 have shown only a slight lift of around 5% to 10% following its recent price cut. We attribute this to the fact that Microsoft’s lower priced Arcade model remained unchanged in price at $199 while the Elite model, while lowered by $100, really just replaced the Pro Model (which is being phased out) at $299. In addition, given our checks on the PS3, it does appear that the PS3 is picking up some share at the expense of the 360," he said.

Their checks are wrong. the 360 was up 16% for the week of the 5th, and 28% the week before. And the reasons behind the PS3's increase being bigger than the 360's are

 

PS3 had a bigger price cut (as this analyst correctly stated)

The PS3 price cut was more well known, hence sales were actually well below what they 'should have been' (oh, the analyst missed that somehow)



hate analysts



Official Member of the Xbox 360 Squad 

 

This is a very good analysis. He is not biased and claiming a 500% increase but has mentioned reasonable numbers. The market is also realising that the 360 is obselete and with a system available at such a good price with blu ray and better games than 360 now and being released in the future.



CGI why waste your breath? the old saying is you can lead a horse to water but you can,t make it drink.let him believe what he wants to,360 obsolete? wow just wow.



Don,t be Fanboys,Be Gamefans,Play games 4ever...GAME ON(msn)

                                     

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What about profits? Let's say MS pulls a profit and Sony posts another big loss, who really wins? I'm not saying that will happen, but it could. If you sell more but lose more money, it seems like a Pyrrhic victory.



Anyone can guess. It takes no effort to throw out lots of predictions and have some of them be correct. You are not and wiser or better for having your guesses be right. Even a blind man can hit the bullseye.

Grimes said:
What about profits? Let's say MS pulls a profit and Sony posts another big loss, who really wins? I'm not saying that will happen, but it could. If you sell more but lose more money, it seems like a Pyrrhic victory.

True, but MS is about $6 billion in the red all-time in the gaming industry, while Sony is 1-2 billion in the black still.

And by selling more consoles without too huge of a loss, they'll keep selling more and more software.  I think they lose $50 per slim now or something...which is way less than they were losing earlier this gen and it's an amount they can make back and more.  The Playstation line was in the black last quarter, last I heard on the matter.

 



LOL your signature. too funny



Loud_Hot_White_Box said:
Grimes said:
What about profits? Let's say MS pulls a profit and Sony posts another big loss, who really wins? I'm not saying that will happen, but it could. If you sell more but lose more money, it seems like a Pyrrhic victory.

True, but MS is about $6 billion in the red all-time in the gaming industry, while Sony is 1-2 billion in the black still.

And by selling more consoles without too huge of a loss, they'll keep selling more and more software.  I think they lose $50 per slim now or something...which is way less than they were losing earlier this gen and it's an amount they can make back and more.  The Playstation line was in the black last quarter, last I heard on the matter.

 

 

Sony's network product division, which includes gaming,  lost $414 million last quarter. They were not in the black.



Anyone can guess. It takes no effort to throw out lots of predictions and have some of them be correct. You are not and wiser or better for having your guesses be right. Even a blind man can hit the bullseye.

PS3 shortages - lies.
PS3 eating into 360 sales and reducing the sales deficit - Yeah probably for 12 months the PS3 will outsell the 360 between 2 to 3 million. 360 price cuts in 2010 would turn the tables in 360's favour in regards to weekly sales.

A sense of de ja vu'? 2007/08 and 2008/09 were reversed in regards to both systems getting the upper hand of the other in regards to sales. Beating out its competitor by 2 to 3 million systems over 12 months due to price cut impact which generated sales momentum.

2009/10 and 2010/11 will most likely follow the trend. PS3 outsells the 360 by 2 to 3 million sales for 12 months and then late 2010 the 360 further reduces its prices and then the 360 with its biggest games library for late 2010 will outsell PS3 by 1 to 2 million over the next 12 months.