The winner for hardware revenue in December is.....Sony

[Sullla]

Gazz said:

I am bloody serious with my comment. Higher revenue allows a greater chance of profit as you so beautifully said it yourself. I admit it's an abstract view, but first and foremost it's a valid view and that's what matters. I never said that Sony might make a profit that Nintendo did, all I pointed out was that they might make a profit at this point and assuming they make a loss automaticly is narrowminded.

 I have seen no proof that the losses generated by Sony's gaming division are only based on the PS3 startup costs. Perhaps Sony investeds hundreds of millions into the new PSP model and they are also making a new PS2 model. In contrary to the other figures of previous quarters, the PSP suddendly started to sell like hot cupcakes and they may have made a huge profit. Once again, not saying it is true, but it is a possiblity you have to keep in mind.

 It's wrong to assume that Sony just stood still in these last couple of months and nothing has been changed in the PS production line itself. You can win and lose millions in the production process and it's fair enough to atleast keep those factors in mind.It's strange how everyone who tryes to look at this topic from a different perspective gets labeled as being a Sony fanboy.

Well, it's not IMPOSSIBLE for Sony to turn a profit this quarter, but... I would say it's incredibly unlikely. You'll have to forgive my skepticism when Sony's gaming division has posted (very large) losses for six consecutive quarters, followed by an aggressive price cut... and then you want me to believe that the upcoming seventh quarter will show a turnaround profit? Like I said, it's possible, but... Well, a lot of things are possible.

Since you seem to believe that Sony has a good chance of turning a profit, if you don't mind telling me, where exactly is that profit going to come from? I have trouble believing it's going to come from the PS2 (sales are way down from last year in hardware/software, when Sony still managed to lose over $2 billion) or the PSP (hardware sales are maginally up - after a price cut! - and software remains very sluggish). Is the PS3 going to take up the slack? In a best case scenario Sony is breaking even on hardware sales (which I very much don't believe is the case), meaning the slow software sales would have to cover all of the expenses associated with production, development, distrubution, advertising, etc.

I don't see any realistic way that this is even remotely possible. In fact, I would be very surprised if Sony posts a loss of less than $500m for this quarter. But I'd be interested to hear your opinion on the matter and get a contrasting viewpoint.