| Zippy6 said: The production cost of the Switch was estimated at $260 back at launch, it'll be much cheaper to produce now and the OLED changes were estimated to only add $10 onto the production cost. Nintendo's profit margins on Switch hardware, especially the OLED, is likely to be very very big. Even if the new model costs significantly more to make they can still price it the same as the OLED and still make a profit. The Steam Deck starts at $399 after all and while that may or may not be sold at a loss the next Switch doesn't need an expensive X86 APU or 16gb of ram. Nintendo's wider audience don't care about having a "much more powerful system" so prioritising specs over price would be a mistake. People are still flocking to the Switch in 2023 with it's ancient technology and a price tag that hasn't been reduced. A weaker cheaper console will do better for Nintendo than a more expensive more powerful console. There is no need to risk putting off consumers with a higher price tag for everyone. It needs to be more powerful, it doesn't need to be $399 levels of more powerful. Also, not that I think PlayStation/Xbox have a significant impact on Nintendo sales, but it's worth noting that $399 would put them firmly in that territory. I fully expect the new PS5 "slim" that is supposedly launching this fall will be the same $399 as the digital edition, all-be-it also without a disc drive. By the end of 2024 we could see a $399 tag for an Xbox Series X revision too. For Nintendo price tag is far more important than specs. They should just make the best system they can for $299 or $349 that the technology available allows, which in 2024 should be a lot better than what they managed in 2017. |
Nintendo themselves said that the OLED model has the lowest profit margin of all models.
