I'm Calling It: The Console & Portable Peak For HW/SW Has Passed Already

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We don't have Sony's results yet but I don't think it matters for hardware in terms of the peak.

Year Ending          X360              Wii             PS3               FY Total HW

FY 3/2006             3.20m                                                         3.20m                  

FY 3/2007             7.70m           5.84m         3.55m                 17.13m

FY 3/2008             8.10m          18.61m        9.12m                  35.80m

FY 3/2009             11.20m        25.95m        10.06m                 47.21m

FY 3/2010             10.00m        20.53m         13m (Sony Prj)     43.53m

Sony would have to beat its projection by over 3.5m to prevent a decline in hardware shipments despite price cuts in the past year and prior years from all three companies. Now, here are my estimates for the year ending March 2011 (again, Sony's forecast isn't out yet)

FY 3/2011             8m              18m              12m              38m

The handhelds are definitely in decline too (using production shipments for PSP before April 2006 - PSP shipments to retailers are ~3m lower).

Year Ending      DS          PSP          Total

FY 3/2005        5.27m     3.0m        8.27m

FY 3/2006       11.46m    14.10m    25.52m

FY 3/2007       23.56m    9.6m         33.16m                          

FY 3/2008      30.31m      13.8m      44.11m

FY 3/2009      31.18m      14.1m      45.29m

FY 3/2010      27.11m      10m (Prj)  37.11m

DS / PSP software has definitely peaked too - was 247m in the March 2009 year, will be under 200m in the year ending March 2010.

We don't have sold X360 shipment information, but my guess it has a high-6 attach rate worldwide (its ~5 ish in EMEA and Japan going by our data) so Wii + PS3 + X360 SW has likely peaked too. My guess is it has gone something like this:

Year Ending   X360      Wii        PS3          Total

FY 3/2006      11m                                     11m

FY 3/2007      35m      28.84m    13.3m      77.14m

FY 3/2008     70m       119.6m    57.9m      247.50m

FY 3/2009     105m     204.58m  103.7m    413.30m

FY 3/2010     115m     191.81m   116.3m?  423.11m

That said, the consoles should have much slower declines for software with Move, Natal and higher purchasing rates per base per year. I think we see something like this in the next year:

FY 3/2011   105m       195m*      112m         ~412m

* Nintendo is projecting 165m games for the fiscal year. However that doesn't include bundled software which is now two games for 16m of those Wiis (Wii Sports Resort & Wii Sports for all Wiis sold in the west after May 9, Wii Sports for all western Wiis sold in the whole period)