Price cut, this... price cut, that. Everything deserves a price cut eventually, but the PS3 in no way, shape, or form can afford to cut its price yet -- it's selling at a loss. Selling at more of a loss would be a step into the Silly Realm, where only the off-balance survive. Anyway, this is what Deutsche Bank analyst Jeetil Patel had to say about the PlayStation 3's market performance thus far:"Next-gen hardware sell-through of 700K units in Feb-07 brought its total HW installed base to 8.0mn in the US, still 30% less than the prior cycle at 11.2mn units at equivalent stages. Xbox 360 (230K) and PS3 (130K) unit sales were below expectations of 250K-300K and 200K respectively. Retail checks reveal that ample supply exists, suggesting a demand problem for next-gen consoles...PS3 consoles are available at retail but sales are lackluster. Its 130K units sold in February was less than Xbox 360 sales last year (160K) and even less than the original Xbox sales of 140K in Feb-2002."
We suspect a price cut by the end of this year, especially if manufacturing costs decrease greatly due to smaller Cell chips, reliance on software emulation, and the employment of sentient robotic beings who only know how to obey their human creators... for now. Also, performance in Europe will probably be a big factor, since they will be the first to get the "new" version of the PS3 with less junk on the insides.
[Thanks, Jonah!]
