Stringer: Euro PlayStation 3 approaching 800,000 sold
Speaking to the Financial Times, Sony's chief executive, Sir Howard Stringer, says that PlayStation 3 sales are close to reaching 800,000 units in Europe after the system's March 23rd launch. Narrowing it down, Stringer says, "I think [in] the first two days in the UK, £100m ($199m) revenue changed hands and that's probably the largest consumer electronics sale in history." While he doesn't comment on the 82% sales drop that followed the next week (perhaps because it "doesn't mean anything"), he notes that the system's reception in Europe has given it better standing in "the perception wars."
Though the PS3 may have come down from its exceptional UK launch, the perception that the system is tanking simply because it's still in stock across the country remains. It's not aided by the system's performance in Japan either, and Stringer admits that "perhaps we lived up to the expectations in Europe in a way that perhaps we didn't in Japan." Still, analysts are more upbeat about the PS3's longterm fortunes, with one Yuji Fujimori of Goldman Sachs predicting the system to have a 50% market share within 3 years.
Further assurances can be found in Sir Howard's following declaration, "I see no reason why we can't use content to drive the sales of hardware as the network connectivity becomes more sophisticated." Woah, using content to drive hardware sales? Is that some of the crazy"Game 3.0" stuff we've been hearing so much about?
