PS3 sale price spurs costs Sony dear
But the console's still being given away for free
Sony's PlayStation 3 pricing strategy has caused the company to lose around $3bn (£1.5bn/€1.9bn) over the past two fiscal years. But the electronics giant's still willing to give the console away - provided you buy a Bravia telly.
The firm’s 2008 annual report shows that Sony lost $2.1bn in fiscal year (FY) 2007 - the 12 months to 31 March 2007 – and a further $1.1bn in FY2008, as a result of subsidising the console's retail price. The production cost of the PS3 was thought to be about $800 (£400/€500) when it launched back in 2006.
It’s not all doom and gloom for Sony, however, because PS3 sales increased by around 5.6m units globally during fiscal 2008 - the 12 months to 31 March 2008 – compared to FY2007, bringing total sales to just over 9m consoles for FY2008. PS3 software sales also jumped by 44.6m to 57.9m units during FY2008.
Nonetheless, Sony’s still willing to give the console away for free Down Under. According to a report by Tweak Town, next month the firm will unveil a ‘buy a Bravia, get a PS3 free’ offer in Australia. It’s rumoured the deal will apply to about 11 Bravia LCD models, including the recently launched V4000 range.
Similar offers have been promoted by Sony before, but its latest Bravia-with-free-PS3 push has been limited to 35,000 units – so Aussie gamers and Blu-ray fans will need to be quick.
Such offers aren’t uncommon though, because when the console hit the UK back in March 2007 Virgin Megastore gave free 46in Bravia TVs to around 100 customers at the flagship London store.
COMMENTS
if you don't make money... why bother ?
if microsoft had never bothered with the xbox, they would have a few billion more in their pocket.
while a few billion isn't much to them, you have to wonder, if they don't eventually turn a profit ( when the 6th version of x box turns out to be a runaway success ? ), what exactly is the point?
and the same for sony - if there's no eventual profit, why bother?
haha what a suprize
well ya see all you noobs out there saying ps3 is the greatest console ever haha no way microsoft is killing sony and its ps3 and very soon you will see sony die with its ps3 never liked what they did to the ps3 anyway its to big and bulky not many good games apart from the odd one also ps3 online experience is crap compared to microsofts online hahahah ps3 sucks
@ Sam
Quote: "The final boot for PC gaming was when I bought Forged Alliance pack for Supreme commander, and found that even though I had 4Gb ram, 3 SATA2 disks in a RAID 5 config and a £200 video card (when I bought it 1950XTX) I still had to run it at mid settings and accept the stutter while playing."
Yeah, but I'll bet that even at mid settings it still looked better than the PS3's 'HD' graphics.
@ mark
If noone wants to buy one, why does the same article you're commenting on says sales are up by 5.6 million?
Moron.
Aha how foolish indeed!!!
And by learning from their mistakes i bet they're not considering developing for the Wii at all right now!!! Because all the money is at the PS3!!!!
CHECK THE FACTS PEOPLE
PS3 = MONEY
