http://www.gamezone.com/news/sony-ps3-sales-slightly-ahead-of-15-million-yearly-target

Sony is sticking by its target to sell 15 million PlayStation 3 consoles during the financial year to the end of March 2012. Sony told reporters on Thursday that PS3 sales were slightly ahead of target, despite the long-running dept crises in Europe.  Andrew House, who took over as head of Sony Computer Entertainment less than four months ago didn't release a specific number, but felt comfortable enough to stick by their original target of 15 million consoles sold. 

According to Eurogamer, "As of 2nd November 2011, Sony had sold 56 million PlayStation 3 units since launch. Microsoft has sold 57.6 million Xbox 360 units since launch."

House did stop short of giving a unit sales estimate for Sony's upcoming handheld, the PlayStation Vita, whichlaunches in Japan on Saturday - two months before the U.S. release in late-February.  The Vita has sold out in advance bookings in Japan, but will face a tougher challenge in western markets like the U.S. and Europe.

House said profitability with the Vita hardware sales would depend on currency rates, which have hurt Sony due to the yen's rise against the euro.

i hope they make it, and profit starts flowing in. it's hard on everyone, and every company, so i hope for a turnaround very soon.

So PS3 is UP YoY for sure now.

And VGC had PS3: 53,985,614

2,014,386 on shelves.

Hopefully they are ready to manufacture more if it's the case and it doesn't result in the shortage like two years ago when the slim and price drop happened.

Worldwide is always better news for the console than America.

When all the information comes in including the shipment numbers and Nintendo charts, I expect the gap to decrease this quarter again.  The PS3 has many difficult to track regions it sells better than other consoles, which is no fault of the people putting up the numbers on this site.

These are impressive numbers. It's hard to believe that Sony would be in this situation after seeing the first couple of years that the PS3 unfortunately had to suffer through.

According to this site, as of 5th of November. The PS3 sold 55.33 million and Xbox 360 57.75 million. So Xbox is probably overtracked.

Interesting. Last year after they released christmas Q shipments they didn't revise their 15m forecast which was ending in 2 months from then, which means they expected 2.8 for Q1. They missed it by 700k, either they didn't want to revise, or the earthquake affected their shipments and that's the reason they only shipped 2.1.

They expect 'slighly ahead' of 9.5M over next 6 months then. If Q1 was expected to be 2.8 last year but faltered due to the earthquake or whatever reaosns, then it's likely they expect 2.8~ again next Q1, leaving 6.7~ with the slightly ahead figures matched on to both? Perhaps 7.1 and 2.6

Ranges can be anywhere from:

Q4 - 6.7 - 7.5

Q1 - 2.1 - 3

Wish MS were more open with their numbers like Sony and Ninty, makes it easier to know how sales are panning out

No. 57.6 is referencing Microsofts end of Q3 shipment figures (ended Sep 30th) and I assume Nov 2nd PS3 numbers is referencing PS3 shipments, suggesting they shipped 500k over October.

Exactly... 500k in October... Microsoft figure is 30th Sep.

2 million on shelves before Nov/Dec is fine... I guess VGC tracked well til 2nd October.

VGC shows PS3 sold  53,985,614 53,972,644 at 1st October.

Edit - I checked again the number was 10k less than a wrote http://www.vgchartz.com/weekly/40818/Global/

56m - shipped
54m - sold

2m on shelves