Nintendo Financial Report is IN

[TheSource]

For comparison's sake:

April 10, 2002 - Bloomberg news reports that Nintendo has shipped four million GameCubes between the US and Japan, and expects even stronger sales of the hardware in 2002. According to the report, Nintendo hopes to sell 12 million GameCubes globally by the end of the year.

Nintendo, which beat its own profit forecasts this quarter by 38%, is betting on a successful launch of the videogame console in Europe on May 3, and system-selling software such as Legend of Zelda, Mario Sunshine, Metroid Prime, and Star Fox Adventures to push three times the units.

GameCube will remain a distant second to Sony's PlayStation 2 in terms of overall sales regardless of whether or not the company can ultimately sell through 12 million pieces of hardware.

http://cube.ign.com/articles/357/357088p1.html

But...

Nintendo Downgrades Fiscal Outlook

Company expects to ship less GCNs; news on earnings from Rare sale; more.

by IGN Staff

October 1, 2002 - According to the Nikkei Weekly, Nintendo has revised its fiscal 2003 outlook, ending in March 2003 due to stronger yen. Previously estimated to be a group net profit of 90 billion yen, the company has revised the projection to Y80 billion (approx. 650 million US dollars). Stronger yen (versus dollar value in the US, for instance) makes exporting more expensive (i.e. selling GameCube is more expensive in the US as opposed to Japan). For comparison, in the previous fiscal year, Nintendo posted a group net profit of 106.44 billion yen.

A spokesman for the company also said that Nintendo expects to ship 10 million GameCubes over the entirety of fiscal 2003, down from the initial projections of 12 million.

Lastly, Nintendo's net balance was somewhat improved by the Y19 billion (approx. $155 million) special profit from the sale of its 49% in the now Microsoft-owned Rare.

http://cube.ign.com/articles/372/372753p1.html

Finally,

GameCube Benchmark Unmet

Nintendo fails to sell as many GCNs as it had projected.

by IGN Staff

April 7, 2003 - Bloomberg reports that Nintendo's full-year profits have fallen by 38 percent due to lagging sales of its next-generation GameCube console. The company's net income was still 66 bill yen, or about $547 million.

Nintendo's projection that 10 million GameCubes would be sold by March 31, 2003 went unmet. The company had only sold 5.6 million GCNs by that period. Microsoft has sold more than eight million Xbox systems around the world since the console's release, according to Bloomberg.

GameCube software sales totaled 44.5 million copies, well shy of Nintendo's 55 million target.

"GameCube sales were bad worldwide," Chief Financial Officer Yoshihiro Mori told reporters in Osaka.

Nintendo blamed the sluggish performance of GameCube and its software to rising popularity of such PlayStation 2 titles as Grand Theft Auto.

More as it develops.

http://cube.ign.com/articles/392/392735p1.html

In March 2002, Nintendo had shipped 3.8 million GameCubes worldwide, and projected to be upto ~ 16 million LTD shipped by March 2003 (estimates of 10-12 million for the fiscal year).  Then they dropped that estimate to LTD ~ 14 million shipped by March 2003 (estimates of 10 million for the fiscal year).  When the data for that fiscal year came in, Nintendo had shipped ~ 9.56 million (5.76 million for the fiscal year).  Obviously the change in 4 million+ final expectations to actual sell through suggests Wii could be higher or lower.

For comparison, Nintendo shipped 5.84 million Wii's worldwide by March 2007, despite 2.5 months less time in Japan (even factoring in GC's first months in Europe, figures are in the low 5 millions - despite more time in Japan).  Demand has been stronger in Japan, Europe, and America in 2007 then GC demand in 2002.  Wii sold something like 7x GC numbers in it's 'post launch' January.  6x time the numbers in 'post launch' February.  Still over double the numbers in 'post launch' March, even with Wii supply constrained and GC getting more decent software in March 02'.  Nintendo now expects 14 million Wii's sold in the coming fiscal year.  Even if they miss their target by 4 million units (like GC, and a worst case scenario given much stronger Wii-momentum), that would esssentially put Wii sales/demand at double GC sales/demand post 6 month launch period.  If that were to continue, 40 million would be the absolute floor for Wii worldwide sales.