Supporting a company that exists to make money is a dangerous game. One can, over time, start putting that company on a pedestal that is so high, logic difts out the window and one begins rabidly attacking any opposing opinion — usually in the confines of snarky Internet comment threads. Especially sad cases begin to speak L33t, at which point all hope is lost.
Nintendo is one such company. They exist to make a profit, but it just so happens that their business involves great video games. Sometimes people forget the whole moneymaking part of every corporation, at which point they become your typical hypocrite, myself included. We must always remember this, but geez Nintendo, when you tell the truth so darned much, keeping things in perspective gets difficult.
“Financial services company UBS analyzes the number of Wii consoles that have been manufactured prior to launch and pegs the figure at 2 million. In addition, the report states that at least 7 million and potentially as many as 9 million consoles are in the production pipeline and will be ready by year-end. This represents an increase from Nintendo’s publicly-announced target of 6 million Wii consoles by the end of the year. The data was obtained by analyzing product orders from the electronics firm Broadcom Corporation which manufactures the WiFi and Bluetooth chips for the Wii, and was used to predict greater-than-expected sales growth for the wireless electronics company. For gamers, however, the interesting data is not about Broadcom but about Nintendo, who seem to be readying for a massive sales push for the upcoming Christmas season.
That last bit in bold was for those who don’t seem to think Nintendo is marshalling some kind of immense marketing campaign for the Wii this holiday. Those massive magazine ads Blake showed you earlier were only the beginning, believe me.
They hired Reggie, in the beginning, because of what he was single-handedly able to do for VH1. He turned that network into a ratings powerhouse that now bests MTV on a daily basis. I guarantee we haven't yet begun to see the marketing that will launch sales into the cosmos. Oh what a glorious holiday it will be…
I just have to ask. by year end, do they mean new year or end of the fiscal year (march 2007)???
Has to be fiscal year…And to those people that keep complaining about the Wii's $250.00 price tag: this is another reason why the price makes sense… Unlike Sony and MS, who take a big loss for every console they sell, and thus they can't sell too many on launch day, with this price Nintendo will be able to put a Wii on the hands of anyone who wants one!
The article in question reports that they have the capacity to prduce 11 mil by end of calendar year 06… much higher than the 6 million publicly reported