Sony: Nintendo is losing audience, not expanding it

@#50:
"Sony went from 0% market share in the handheld market, to whatever they have now. That is a win for them. Even if they aren't winning the race. The DS while selling stupendously doesn't have that much of an edge in the hardware side of sales. Lopsided NPD sales withstanding. Software sales are a whole nother story. The DS is a gold mine for developers.

That, people, is what our Sony guy was talking about and why you people need to comprehend what people say instead of rushing to judgement. If Nintendo had said this and the numbers were reversed then you guys would still come out bashing Sony."

Those are good points. I offer this:

When a single company owns a market, then anyone entering in and having ANY success will mean that the original market share goes down and the new one goes up. Nothing really to brag about (except for marketing people) because this is obvious.

However, defining what success is when entering a market is different. I don't know what Sony set as their goals for success for the PSP, but us here in the blogosphere and analysts were predicting the PSP would own the handheld market (but I won't go into the reasons...this has been stated over and over).

Reality is different. Not only is the DS "inferior" technology, but it is selling like gangbusters and is leaving the PSP in the dust. Both hardware and software sales.

In addition, the DS seems to be widening the lead over the PSP as time goes on. In the end, you will have a situation where DS to PSP sales will look like PS2 to Gamecube sales.

Whereas Sony may still be taking a bath on the PSP as far as profit, I don't believe Nintendo ever lost money on the DS sales. So if you look at success from a making money point of view, I think we all agree that Nintendo is staying healthy and strong as a company due to the DS strategy. I don't think we can say the same of the PSP which is looking on gaining critical market share, which I'll say it has not.

Yes, while the PSP is selling well, when compared to it's competitor, it is getting crushed.

I also like it when PR states facts that are no longer relevant, like those that compare each system's first 17 months. Step into the TODAY machine, Ken, and tell the story that is the here and now. What happened in the past should stay there as it does not tell the true story of what is happening today. But, of course, what choice does he have?

@#68
"RIGHT NOW DS is kicking PSPs ass so bad it's like watching a price fighter take apart a nerd."

Dude, that is just a great analogy. Kudo's!

Regardless of that Sony's installed base is smaller and grows at a smaller rate. We could say what happened to the PSX/PS2 audience in the hand held area? Sony couldn't deliver? Apart from that the PSP has not had relatively good news with stores pulling UMD movies.

A quick look at the hock shops in Sydney & Melbourne show a mountain of second hand PSP's.

So if the idea of "sold" is a reference to the customer base (IE: market potential for software & UMD Movies) - I would suggest that half of Sony's PSP customer base is sitting on shelves or packed away in the back of the wardobes.

P.S Sony UMD movies are now down to AU$10 (US$7.50) across the board at Dick Smith Powerhouse (a major Aust retailer) and still not selling...

Sony's attempt to expand their audience beyond gamers with the PSP failed.

Sony tried to appeal to non-gamers with the PSP's media capabilities. The PSP expanded into the portable media player market (occupied by Microsoft Portable Media Center devices, like the Creative Labs Zen Vision). It worked for the first year - I know several people who bought PSPs early one because of their video and photo capabilities, but their PSPs are collecting dust now. But UMDs are dead in the water. No one buys PSPs anymore for UMD anymore, and the people who bought the PSP for UMD aren't buying games for it, so I would conclude that the PSP failed to expand into the PMP market.

The DS is absolutely CRUSHING the PSP right now. Tretton gets an E for effort, though. He took the truth (DS outselling PSP by 100,000/week in Japan and 100,000/month in the US) and spun it to "PSP is winning".

The funny thing is, though, that a lot of people probably bought it. How good is Nintendo doing right now? Their stock has risen %75 in the last year. (That is good, for you non MBA holding readers)

It'll be interesting to see if the Nintendo MP3 player will affect the race at all. I know most of the people who have a PSP - myself included - justify owning the unit as a result of it's PMP capabilities. Of course, by that merit, the PSP is a terrible PMP when compared to other avaliable ones.

That's where the Zune comes in...

I really dislike it when people screw around with words and numbers in order to make a situation seem to favor them. If I want Sony's opinion as of late I'll hit the button on an electric hand dryer.

Don't get me wrong, I'm no Nintendo fanboy. In fact I finally bought a PS2 to replace my increasingly outdated PS1 recently. Which also proves that I don't have much money to blow on videogames. Therefore the innovative Wii and the DS look much more appealing to casual gamers like me than the impressive but horrendously expensive PSP and PS3.

The PSP is definitely a success and I'm sure the PS3 will be also, but Sony needs to chill out and stop blowing hot air every which way. Nobody likes arrogance.

"You say PSP is 'Modern'"

I wasn't talking about the PSP. Handhelds are yesterday's technologies. They play old games, rehashes and a few new games running on old hardware.

If i'm to play the current crop of games, i've to look into nextgen consoles or PCs...

Um, just a question on 2 points here but did anyone think that alot of PSP players used to be Nintendo handheld players?

And 2 Did anyone consider that of all of these numbers there may be people that own both?

So yes Sony did muscle in on teritory that was all Nintendo previously, and did gain marketshare there while nintendo lost alot of players to psp..... the statement isnt wrong, just the interpretations.

And yes i do own both :P

I grabbed mine and havent regretted it since. It travels with me where as my ds is less useful to myself personally. It makes it easy to flip between games and the internet when I'm on the road as well as the MP3/aac fuctionality, rss feeds for my favored news sites (normally gaming based lol go fig) and podcasts from the net. DS started EXTREMELY slow as far as i was concerned (as far as the fun factor for games) however the pick-up and play factor is highly useful as I've been increasingly busy. They're getting a slew of better games over time though so thats good. But i still find myself drawn back to my PSP more.

As for my Favorite PSP games: Mercury, Lumines(damn you lumines give me my mind back!), Lemmings, Tokobot, and Death JR. are all a blast. The early adventure and action games were bad , but theyre getting better.

Hope that helps.

since the release of the DS Lite they are ouselling the psp at a rate of 4 to 1 modt months or 5 to 1 this months it a battering, not even a contest..

If it carries on at this rate the ds will have an 80% market share

i want his job.
i can do a lot better job than him based on the actual facts.
losers like these get to top by asslicking, not capacity.

dslite is a worldwise sucess.

"I wasn't talking about the PSP. Handhelds are yesterday's technologies. They play old games, rehashes and a few new games running on old hardware."

So what? Even last gen technology is more than good enough for fun.

Guys, I think the true lesson learned here is that the Phantom will outsell all.

this is the funniest posting ive ever seen ahhh hahaha...yea sony is cracked out...i had a psp sold it and got a ds...i barely play portables though. i got a 360 and unless sony drops a bomb or something i dont plan on gettin a ps3.

Sony are once again talking out of their A-holes.
I know for a fact I've brought two PS2's due to their early terrible build quality, so does that mean they aren't expanding their installation base?

The fact is Nintendo are winning, sure they've lost market share compared to the GameBoy days, but when your the only one in the market, you can't help but lose market share when competition comes in. I know many, many adults with a DS or DS Lite. Women and men. I don't know a single PSP owner.

*Pats Sony's back* ... Its ok... denial is the first step

*shakes head sadly while Sony cries in my arms*..

...LMFAO.

ehm, i don't know about you guys, but the profit making begins with games. and from the look of it, the top 10 sold games each month has 5 or more ds games in it.

So how's the wonderful Sony PR team going to spin their inevitable loss of market share and Nintendo's likely gain of marketshare this coming generation?

You make some good points, But keep in mind that the GBA is slowly losing market share, wether thats going to the DS or the PSP isn't really known for fact, but some of the most appealing things about the GBA are its large library of games price and simplicity, things that the DS gets closer to matching all the time. And also as has been stated earlier, he is getting his "adoption rate" numbers from strictly US sales, but not clarifying that. For a proffesional marketing guy of a big company, he should be able to make clearer statments than that.

Who cares. Sony sell ?? PSPs, Nintendo sell ?? DSs. Why do people get so worked up about this crap? Buy what you want to buy and play what you want to play.
Let the money men at the corporations worry about the rest.

Sony allways was idiots .. like with the ps2 they claimed it was the 1st 128bit console - wrong sega was
it has exicting games (i mean in the beginning) ff is not exicting .. so .. wrong .sega has .. sa2 crazy taxi < ported to the ps2 very badly but still had it fun about it . and now they stupid enough to talk crap about nintendo . i think sony just take the biscuit .. if it wasent for nitendo trying to produce a cd based snes sony wouldent have descovered and made the ps1 or ps2 .. and as for "the great things they proclaim" im sure you can look back and see that pcs already do that and more .. dreamcast has done it xbox and gamecube have all done it .. but sony seem to fall out one short all the time.. optimised cd speeds and antialiasing makes the ps2 stop dead in its tracks agaianst competitors .. and as for the ps3 it would likely to have the same problem .. if not worst .. so get ready for it ..

Put it this way. When parents buy their kids the new Nintendo and realize their kids keep breaking controllers (nevermind the stronger armed adults) from throwing the gayest controller configuration I've ever seen across the room....I am lost for words. That is the worst thing EVER I have ever seen for a controller. If you look on their website, (if you can get through because the bandwidth or something is as poorly managed as the controller), you'll notice only adults trying out the system. I wanna see all those kids on Christmas day whipping that controller at the new plasma screen TV and breaking them both. Nintendo is now under the definition of moron!