Microsoft is seeing shortages of its Xbox 360 video game console in the United States, as the company failed to anticipate strong post-holiday demand, an executive said on Wednesday.

"We are really running short of product here in the United States," Jeff Bell, head of global marketing for Microsoft's games business, said in an interview. "You could say we misjudged demand."

The comments come a day before market research firm NPD is expected to release video game sales data for January. Bell said Microsoft was hoping to "manage expectations."

"We're literally out of stock in many stores. We think this will have an impact on our sales," Bell said. "It may cause the overall industry number to be down a little bit.

"Retailers have been really upset, they are on allocation. It is a lag I think we're seeing in January and that may continue into February, then as spring ramps up, we'll be able to meet that demand."

Microsoft sold nearly 1.3 million Xbox 360 consoles in the United States in December, when the entire video games industry gets a boost from holiday shopping.

The Xbox 360 competes with Nintendo's Wii console, as well as Sony's PlayStation 3.

 http://www.news.com/Microsoft-seeing-Xbox-shortages-in-U.S./2100-1043_3-6230495.html

OK -- what gives did they just let supply run out, or is this real? 

There have been rumors of shortages all over the place so Bell is probably telling the truth.

Looks like MS overreacted after stuffing the channel in Holiday 06. Whoops. Maybe the third time is the charm.

Thats kind of sad if its seeing shortages and its still at the bottom of weekly sales.

is Microsoft pulling a "Nintendo"? ;)

With about 6 Halo "Limited" edition xbox360 still sitting in the store, it's very hard for me to believe 360 is on short supply.

LOL, they are NOT confident in x360. =))))

He's right. Walk into any store and you'll see one console in plentiful supply - PS3 40gbs. Everything else - is pretty much sold out.

 Yea i live in Jersey near Gaints stadium in one of the most populated areas in the U.S. and i still see Halo Xboxes around so i don't trust this shortage news.  Further wtf is wrong with MS if this is true?

 no sorry, you will see all the latest skus of the PS3 and 360 with the nasty green 360 cluttering most of the bottom of the shelves. I'd consider getting another 360 but I would never touch that nasty green glob. 

Probably what happened is after they stuffed the channel they had to cut back on supply and production, because they couldn't store to many and nobody was taking them... and as they cut down on production, those manufacturers went on to make other things, and so they no longer have the plants to produce as many 360s as they did. And if they still do have the plants, then this should have been resolved a long time ago. It takes time to convert plants to start building consoles, but it only takes a month at worst I'd think to get them going again.

And people yell at Nintendo for not producing enough... Nintendo sold 3x more Wiis, Microsoft should have this under control.

I'll post what I posted in another thread:

I actually think the 360 is somewhat supply constrained, but only the Premium model (is that what they're still calling it?). Everywhere I go, I only see Arcades and Halo models. MS doesn't have a problem supplying systems. They're problem is that over the last few months they've been pushing retailers to take on stock of a bullshit system that no one wants, aka the Halo 360.

Now the retailers are stuck with a system that's in greater supply and less popular than the PS3 and they don't want to take on any more 360 stock, even if it is the popular Premium model. This is partly why retailers seem to love the 360; they have so many systems in stock that they have to promote the hell out of the systems. It has always been MS's strategy to flood the market. They did it Christmas 2006 and they were able to trick retail outlets again this past Christmas with that Halo model.