NPD Sales.

[shams]

koffieboon said:
Although only partly related to this topic, does anybody know at what exact stage Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft count a console as being shipped and do we know if they all use the exact same stage?

Yeah, Sony *used* to use a different method (i.e. number "manufactured"), whereas both MS & Ninty used "quantities shipped to retailers" (i.e. based on paid orders from retailers, how many are actually sent to them).

So Sony could manufacture millions, store them in a warehouse (still count them as "sold") - and ship them off two years later (or whenever required).

Thank god they have changed this practice to what the industry does as normal.

...

There will always be a small number of units "in transit" (more so at busy periods, i.e. Xmas) - so sold can never equal shipped. But it can get close.

...

Does Sony "own" any of their own retail stores? I know Ninty have the few "Nintendo World" stores - they 'could' use they to inflate shipped figures (doing so would be pretty stupid, for anything else a face saving increase for fiscal result reporting).