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Forums - Sony - Estimated PS Vita bill of materials : $159.10

Deoz on 28 April 2012
Panama said:
Now factor in production, marketing and R&D costs among other costs.

The 3DS was found back at launch to cost less than $100 in terms of materials, yet at $170 it's selling at a loss and will continue to do so supposedly until August. That in itself should be a strong indicator that the cost of the materials of a platform isn't an adequate measure in discerning as to whether it is profitable.

Also those opting for the Vita to be discontinued after 2million units being sold after being on the market worldwide for a period of about 3 months now, are probably the same individuals that claimed the 3DS was doomed to fail and that the handheld market is dead.

Pretty much this,but i would add that has been longer in the eastern market.



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VetteDude on 28 April 2012

The 2nd hardware revision needs to swap the 3G AT&T HSPA chip for a hybrid 4G LTE/HSPA+ chip. Pings would be like Wifi, good enough for gaming over mobile internet.



chapset on 28 April 2012
Dgc1808 said:
Panama said:
Now factor in production, marketing and R&D costs among other costs.

The 3DS was found back at launch to cost less than $100 in terms of materials, yet at $170 it's selling at a loss and will continue to do so supposedly until August. That in itself should be a strong indicator that the cost of the materials of a platform isn't an adequate measure in discerning as to whether it is profitable.

Also those opting for the Vita to be discontinued after 2million units being sold after being on the market worldwide for a period of about 3 months now, are probably the same individuals that claimed the 3DS was doomed to fail and that the handheld market is dead.


The estimates i saw for 3ds were between 100.71-103. Never saw less than 100.

 3DS 100$Manufacturing vs 170$ sale price. That 70$ isn't covering the retailer cut, marketing, shipping, packaging, etc. I guess.

PSV 160$Manufactuing vs 250$ sale price. That's a 90$ difference so I'm guessing that Vita's profit margin is around 5-10$ assuming Nintendo isn't taking too big of a hit on Each 3DS.


Sony doesn't expect a profit on the psv for the first 3 years so no they are not selling at a profit right now, maybe the most expensive model does tho



Bet reminder: I bet with Tboned51 that Splatoon won't reach the 1 million shipped mark by the end of 2015. I win if he loses and I lose if I lost.

Dgc1808 on 28 April 2012
chapset said:
Dgc1808 said:
Panama said:
Now factor in production, marketing and R&D costs among other costs.

The 3DS was found back at launch to cost less than $100 in terms of materials, yet at $170 it's selling at a loss and will continue to do so supposedly until August. That in itself should be a strong indicator that the cost of the materials of a platform isn't an adequate measure in discerning as to whether it is profitable.

Also those opting for the Vita to be discontinued after 2million units being sold after being on the market worldwide for a period of about 3 months now, are probably the same individuals that claimed the 3DS was doomed to fail and that the handheld market is dead.


The estimates i saw for 3ds were between 100.71-103. Never saw less than 100.

 3DS 100$Manufacturing vs 170$ sale price. That 70$ isn't covering the retailer cut, marketing, shipping, packaging, etc. I guess.

PSV 160$Manufactuing vs 250$ sale price. That's a 90$ difference so I'm guessing that Vita's profit margin is around 5-10$ assuming Nintendo isn't taking too big of a hit on Each 3DS.


Sony doesn't expect a profit on the psv for the first 3 years so no they are not selling at a profit right now, maybe the most expensive model does tho


That statement is being misunderstood everywhere. All statements made point to them not losing money on hardware. That comment you're referring to  means that the entire vita project won't cover all of it's costs (like R&D, Marketting, etc.) until 3 years. Kaz in no way said that the system itself is selling at a loss.



4 ≈ One

darkknightkryta on 28 April 2012

Just throwing this out there but no retailer sells hardware at profit. Hell most laptops aren't sold at profit.



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disolitude on 29 April 2012
logic56 said:
Soleron said:

That's what it costs Sony to have it made for them. This doesn't pay for a single SCE employee to exist, so consider they have thousands of employees in the Playstation division (for marketing, future R&D, testing, returns, firmware, etc) and add that to the cost.

The more Vitas they sell, the more  diluted those fixed costs are over each unit.  If they don't sell enough Vitas it should be obvious they'd make a loss even if each unit was very profitable.

WOW.... desperate

WOW.... vague



chapset on 29 April 2012
Dgc1808 said:
chapset said:
Dgc1808 said:
Panama said:
Now factor in production, marketing and R&D costs among other costs.

The 3DS was found back at launch to cost less than $100 in terms of materials, yet at $170 it's selling at a loss and will continue to do so supposedly until August. That in itself should be a strong indicator that the cost of the materials of a platform isn't an adequate measure in discerning as to whether it is profitable.

Also those opting for the Vita to be discontinued after 2million units being sold after being on the market worldwide for a period of about 3 months now, are probably the same individuals that claimed the 3DS was doomed to fail and that the handheld market is dead.


The estimates i saw for 3ds were between 100.71-103. Never saw less than 100.

 3DS 100$Manufacturing vs 170$ sale price. That 70$ isn't covering the retailer cut, marketing, shipping, packaging, etc. I guess.

PSV 160$Manufactuing vs 250$ sale price. That's a 90$ difference so I'm guessing that Vita's profit margin is around 5-10$ assuming Nintendo isn't taking too big of a hit on Each 3DS.


Sony doesn't expect a profit on the psv for the first 3 years so no they are not selling at a profit right now, maybe the most expensive model does tho


That statement is being misunderstood everywhere. All statements made point to them not losing money on hardware. That comment you're referring to  means that the entire vita project won't cover all of it's costs (like R&D, Marketting, etc.) until 3 years. Kaz in no way said that the system itself is selling at a loss.

well you might be right about the comment but I haven't seen a single statement were they clame making money on the vita (hardware wise)



Bet reminder: I bet with Tboned51 that Splatoon won't reach the 1 million shipped mark by the end of 2015. I win if he loses and I lose if I lost.

Aj_habfan on 29 April 2012

I think the solution is obvious - a Sony Costco type of store. Just straight off the production line, into a generic case, onto the warehouse shelf for customers to pick up.



DepthAlly on 29 April 2012

I hope people don't actually think Sony is making a profit. With all the other added costs and the fact that Sony does NOT get 100% of the $250 when selling a Vita in retail, I think it's safe to say it's being sold at a loss. Not guaranteed, but very likely.



Food for thought: Shove an apple in your brain

outlawauron on 29 April 2012
Slimebeast said:
Panama said:
Now factor in production, marketing and R&D costs among other costs.

The 3DS was found back at launch to cost less than $100 in terms of materials, yet at $170 it's selling at a loss and will continue to do so supposedly until August. That in itself should be a strong indicator that the cost of the materials of a platform isn't an adequate measure in discerning as to whether it is profitable.

Yeah exactly, such as retailer margins, distribution costs, packaging, cost from returns of faulty devices, and more.

It's always the same thing. These lists of raw bill of materials appear and the fans immediately draw the conclusion that there's huge potential for profit per hardware unit sold.

Retailers make next to nothing on gaming hardware. Working in retail, the very large retailer I worked for made less than $3 on every PS3 sold.



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