So, will SONY's CES strategy pay off in the end?

[Euphoria14]

I read this last night.

http://www.notsocommoncents.com/essays/game-theory-how-sony-gave-ps3-another-year-of-profits-with-a-simple-ces-announcement/ 

Why Sony’s Strategy Makes Sense

By communicating to the entire industry that Sony’s stance is that 2012 is not the year for ‘next generation discussions’- Sony hopes to convince Microsoft to extend, at least for another year, the profits of the current generation hardware. As every hardware refresh traditionally brings uncertainty, intense competition, and red ink for the first few years. Sony believes it is likely to succeed with this gambit for two reasons:

Both Sony and Microsoft have taken particularly heavy losses in this generation’s console wars. Sony having subsidized the purchase of its high cost of goods console, due to the addition of a blu-ray player; and Microsoft having written off $1B in loses associated with it’s console’s high failure rates in the early years of release.

In addition, because Microsoft is leading Sony in profits and with Kinect breathing new life into the console, it does not have the same competitive need to announce a next generation console before its competitors- as it did with the Xbox 360.

Sony’s Tactic: Beautifully, Common Cents

 

With more to lose than gain, by starting the next round of console wars, Sony beautifully executed a common cents strategy to reduce needless ambiguity for consumers, industry trade press, and most of all its competitive environment. Depending on how Microsoft responds this should enable Sony to recuperate more of its PS3 investments.

 

 

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It made some sense to me and I thought "Hey, what if this guy is right?"

Then we got this.

http://www.gamezone.com/news/no-xbox-720-e3-announcement-planned-at-the-moment-claims-microsoft

“What we have seen with the Xbox 360 is that the Kinect has extended the life of the console," he added.

“Historically in the 6th or 7th year console sales start flattening or going down because it’s kind of the end of life,” Pinero explained.  “With us launching Kinect a little bit over a year ago, what we saw was a resurgence with Xbox 360.  It makes 360 a brand new console if you think about Kinect and you think about the new dashboard and the new UI that we launched this past November.  It’s like having a brand new console”

With a mindset like that, it's beginning to look clearer that Microsoft has no plans to reveal a new Xbox now, at E3, or anytime in the future of 2012 - and possibly 2013.  Their goal seems to be to transform the Xbox 360 into the all-around entertainment hub.

“We want that box to be the ultimate entertainment device in your house, giving you games, movies, tv shows, music, sports, and all kinds of entertainment.  So I think there’s a lot more that we’ll see on Xbox 360," Pinero concluded.

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I personally hope it did since I am not ready yet for new and expensive console. I would rather let the Wii U release and let this gen ride out a bit longer.

What about you all? Do you think SONY's strategy will pay off?