Sony PSP Sales Way Up 76
WeAz writes "According to an article via Yahoo's news service, Sony is reporting that they have sold 800,000 PSP units since the system's release last month. Demand for the system is so strong that there's already a shortage arising. To combat this, Sony 'would increase monthly PSP production by 100,000 units to one million in April, as it prepared to launch the product in the United States and Europe.' Ken Kutaragi, Sony Computer Entertainment's CEO said that monthly production of the PSP will eventually rise to 3 million units."
Everyone's got the wrong headline... (Score:5, Informative)
They aren't "sold" until they're in the hands of consumers.
Re:MOD PARENT DOWN (Score:1, Informative)
The facts are:
1. Nintendo released enough DS systems to meet demand, which started high, as it grows. They are over the 2 million mark in Japan alone, with high estimates that extend into Q2.
2. Sony, as always, architected a low production of 200,000 PSPs, but still did not sell out of that puny first shipment until about three days after their launch. Subsequent shipments of the PSP sold even more slowly, despite resellers stocking up on it for export thanks to the ridiculous profits to be gained on ebay for a while. Nintendo DS did over 500,000 in the first four days and has outsold the PSP steadily, week after week. And those systems are being sold only for purchase and use by Japanese themselves (increasing the sinificance of these sales), since the DS launched in the U.S. weeks earlier (international early adopters of the DS imported from the U.S., not Japan). The DS launched only ten days before the PSP in Japan, but has sold more than 2.5 times the number of systems there. Do the math; whatever Sony is doing, it's failing them against the Nintendo DS. And anything they try now will only cost them money (facility and production ramp ups = expensive - they already lose money on PSP).
3. With such a low initial production run, it is easy for Sony both to obscure actual demand and inflate perceived desirability in the press. "We've already sold out of PSPs! Everybody wants one, we just have to make more! *oh, btw, we only made ten of the damn things, shh*"
Anyone and his mom can speculate what's going on, but at least be responsible enough to know that you have the facts, before you digest them as such.