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NVIDIA delays RTX 3070 launch to prevent another ordering mess
NVIDIA has announced that it’s delaying the the GeForce RTX 3070 graphics card by two weeks to allow it to build more stock ahead of the launch.
Nintendo: Wii U to be in larger supply than Wii at launch, replenished more quickly
The Wii U will likely be hard to find this Sunday. "All I can say is that the response has been phenomenal," Nintendo EVP of sales and marketing Scott Moffitt told GamesIndustry.biz, "and we're getting, especially in the higher priced deluxe set, that one's selling out incredibly quickly."However, Moffitt has reason to believe the shortages won't stretch on forever as they did with the Wii. He said that more Wii U systems will be in stores at launch than Wiis were in 2006. "And, second, our replenishments will be more frequent this holiday time than during the Wii launch," he said.
RIPE NCC handing out its last block of IPv4 addresses, tries to fend off internet survivalism
In a world where IPv6 lives and IPv4 addresses are scarce, network providers must fight for survival... or at least, claim their IP blocks quickly. The RIPE NCC, the regional internet registry for Asia, Europe and the Middle East, warns that it's down to assigning its last set of 16.8 million IPv4 addresses as of this weekend. That sounds like a lot, but we'd do well to remember that the registry churned through about 5.2 million addresses in just the past two weeks. What's left won't be around for long, folks. To cut back on the number of Mad Max-style battles for dwindling resources, RIPE NCC is rationing out IPv4 for local registries in 1,024-address chunks -- and only to those who both have IPv6 assignments as well as proof of a need for IPv4. With just a bit more than half of the RIPE NCC's customers currently on IPv6, that could still trigger a shortfall among networks that haven't prepared for the internet protocol apocalypse. We'd advise that companies stock up on IPv6 supplies before launching the raiding parties.
Amazon Kindle Touch goes out of stock, sparks conspiracy theories
We hope your heart wasn't set on snagging a Kindle Touch before heading off to school this fall. Both the WiFi and 3G versions of the reader are no longer available as new devices from Amazon's US pages -- if you want one at all in the country, you'll have to swing past a retail store or scour the virtual bargain bins for used models. Suffice it to say that the timing of this vanishing act is extremely convenient in light of Amazon's special event next week, although just what it means is very much an unknown. Is there a light-up sequel on its way? A winnowing of the e-reader line to fewer models? Or just a quick inventory check? We'll have a better answer on September 6th, but the out-of-stock notice is a not-so-friendly reminder that patience is a virtue.
ASUS ramping up Eee Pad Transformer production, says they'll be easier to find in the 'coming weeks'
We couldn't help but notice that a lot of you want to buy the Eee Pad Transformer; it's just that your quest for one is turning up dry. We asked ASUS for an update on the shortage and the company said it's cranking 'em out at a furious pace to meet strong demand. Here's what a PR rep had to say: We are ramping production every week to address the supply concerns, including almost daily air shipments into North America. We expect the supply line to improve significantly over the coming weeks. So there you have it: if you live on the North American continent, at least, you'll soon be able to find an elusive Transformer -- and just in time for a much-appreciated Android 3.1 update.
Apple could agree to component price hike to secure touchscreens
Contending with seemingly insatiable demand for its new iPad 2, Apple is pondering paying higher prices for touch panel components, according to a report from DigiTimes on Wednesday. Manufacturers in Taiwan claim Apple is more open to certain price hikes during negotiations as the California company tries to secure a sufficient supply of components for its popular touchscreen products. Higher component prices, in the short term, will shrink Apple's gross margins on three of its hottest selling products: the iPad, iPhone and iPod touch. But securing adequate availability of touch panels should help the company relieve some of the constraints in its global supply chain. Such a deal would also put pressure on other consumer electronics companies to pay more for the components they need to build competing tablet computers and smartphones. Apple currently faces incredible pressure from consumers and shareholders to address bottlenecks in the supply chain for its successful families of touch panel devices. Lead times for the new iPad 2 ballooned to 4–5 weeks in its first few days on the US market, and the tablet goes on sale to a broader, global market this Friday. Apple reportedly expects to ship 40 million iPads in 2011. The company is also expected to launch its next generation iPhone later this year. The earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan earlier this month further fueled concerns over possible touch panel supply shortages. According to AppleInsider, a recent report suggested Foxconn, Apple's manufacturing partner, has only two or three weeks' worth of touch panels stockpiled. If the situation in Japan doesn't improve, Foxconn could deplete its stock of touch panel components. Despite these concerns, DigiTimes believes Apple is well positioned to weather a shortage of touch panels. Apple has already booked an estimated 60 percent of the world's touch panel output capacity. As the global market leader in touchscreen devices, Apple will continue to control the lion's share of the world's touch panel supply and enjoy lower component pricing than its competition. "Supply for touch panel[s]...will be more smooth for Apple," concluded DigiTimes. [via AppleInsider]
Toshiba and Hitachi LCD plants damaged, will shut down for a month
You can't have a 9.0 magnitude earthquake without breaking a few factories, particularly ones that produce fragile liquid crystal screens, and this week Toshiba, Hitachi and Panasonic are each reporting damages that have forced them to close LCD production facilities affected by the tsunami and quake. Panasonic isn't sure when its plant in Chiba prefecture might resume carving up the glass sandwiches, telling Bloomberg that "there has been some damage, though not a fire or a collapse," but both Hitachi and Toshiba will reportedly halt some assembly lines for around a month to deal with damages. It's probably still too soon to talk about panel shortages -- though they seem likely soon -- but we'll let you know how things progress.
"Notable" slowdown at Foxconn manufacturing concerns Apple (Updated)
A slowdown in Foxconn's manufacturing may have a negative impact on the future supply of Apple products. According to Alex Guana of JMP Securities, "Hon Hai's (Foxconn) growth decelerated from 84% (year over year) in the month of December to 37% in January and then again to 26% in February." The reasons for this deceleration are not known, but the slowdown is concerning enough that JMP has downgraded its outlook on Apple from "Market Outperform" to "Market Perform." This unfavorable assessment is not based on the quality of Apple's products, but on Foxconn's ability to deliver an increasing number of Apple products in a timely manner. For the past year, Apple has struggled to meet demand for its popular smartphone and tablet. Both the original iPad and the iPhone 4 were plagued by shortages that forced the Cupertino company to delay the international launch of the iPad and rollout the iPhone 4 slowly to new carriers worldwide. Apple's recent earnings conference call confirmed iPhone 4 supplies are still constrained, and a slowdown by Foxconn may exacerbate this problem. It is worthy to note that this report does also consider the negative impact of the Japanese earthquake on the global supply of NAND flash and other electronics components. Until production levels in Japan can be restored, the next few months may be rough for Apple and its fans. Update: Another analyst cited by AppleInsider refutes this negative conclusion put forth by Gauna. Analyst Yair Reiner of Oppenheimer & Co. points out that Apple accounts for only 20% of Hon Hai's total sales. The link between the two companies is so small that any slowdown in Foxconn's growth will have no effect on Apple. Reiner writes, "The correlation between Apple and Hon Hai's revenue therefore appears to be a product of coincidence more than causality."
Apple creating touch panel shortages for tablet competition?
Things tend to get messy for the competition when Apple decides to direct its vast cash reserves on "very strategic" components. Especially when Cupertino starts waving around stacks of dough in the range of $3.9 billion to $7.8 billion. For reference, just look at what Apple did to NAND supplies as the flash-based iPod rose to dominance. Today DigiTimes is reporting that Apple is occupying close to 60 percent of the global touch panel production capacity from the likes of Wintek and TPK resulting in "tight supply" for the competition. The impact on consumers, according DigiTimes' sources at upstream component makers, is that tablet PC makers are unable to ship enough product to match orders due to component shortages. The issue is especially troublesome for second-tier tablet hopefuls who must compete with the likes of HP, RIM, Motorola, HTC, Samsung, LG, Dell (everyone but Sony) for the scraps. As a result, Apple should be able to more easily meet iPad demand in 2011, according to DigiTimes, while its competitors struggle to keep up.
UK Kinect shortages not 'managed,' says Microsoft exec (but totally welcome, we presume)
In the fall of 2006, global shortages of the Wii were met with accusations of "managed scarcity" – the polite way of saying that Nintendo was keeping inventory low to help weave a tale of unprecedented demand. Four years of steady sales (well ... let's agree on three-and-a-half) has helped clear Nintendo's good name; however, similar accusations are evidently being levied against Microsoft, which has been accused of managing shortages of the Kinect in the UK and Ireland to "stimulate demand," according to GamesIndustry.biz. "Anyone who actually works in the business of producing new technology, especially hardware technology, will know that these things are never managed," general manager for Xbox in the UK and Ireland Neil Thompson told GI. "Everyone else loves to think that they're managed, but they will know it's not. It's a function of coming to market with a brand new innovation and you have to scale up." With a goal of 5 million units in consumers' hands worldwide by the end of 2010, and a post-Black Friday milestone of 2.5 million already sold, Microsoft doesn't seem to be in the business of withholding inventory. Thompson said that the decision to launch in November was a "balance," and Kinect could have waited "until February, March when we could hit some bigger launch numbers but then we miss Christmas." Also to blame for any shortages at retailers: that worldwide release. Xbox UK marketing manager Stephen McGill told GI, "With Kinect we launched around the world in three weeks. That was a huge task. No region is being penalised." As much as we want to trust a Microsoft marketing manager, we thought we'd instead conduct an entirely scientific poll to determine if there's any global concern with Kinect shortages. %Poll-56510%
LG: 'Apple may have to delay launches of the iPad for some countries'
We're not certain how many screen suppliers Apple has at this point, but LG is certainly a major player, so our ears tend to perk up when the Korean manufacturer admits it can't stay ahead of the game. LG CEO Kwon Young-Soo told reporters the firm just can't keep up with incredible demand for the iPad's brilliant 9.7-inch IPS display, and suggested that Cupertino might actually have to slow international expansion as a direct result. "Apple may have to delay launches of the iPad for some countries due to tight component supplies and strong demand," he said, adding that even if the firm were to increase production capacity, supplies would remain tight through early 2011. Residents of Austria, Belgium, Hong Kong, Ireland, Luxembourg, Mexico, New Zealand, Singapore and The Netherlands came in under the wire, but it sounds like there may be another wait for the rest of the world.
iPad supply constraints still in play, says Piper Jaffray
As we noted earlier, finding the iPad of your dreams hasn't been getting any easier in recent days. Even with an assumed uptick in production to handle the imminent overseas launch, the search for available units on the ground in the US has been tough. Today's Apple 2.0 note on availability cites a report from Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster, who found that 74% of the 50 retail outlets he surveyed had no iPads in stock, and those that did have some in house only had Wi-Fi models; the 3Gs remain scarce as four-leaf clovers. With 10 day delivery waits on online orders, it's clear that demand has not slackened -- but it may be that a good chunk of the manufacturing allocation is currently heading for the aforementioned country launches that will kick off one week from today. You would think that "We're selling every one of them we can make" is a pretty good problem to have, but that doesn't always play that well. In a classic maneuver known as "the market's glass of unicorn tears is half-empty," Munster simultaneously acknowledges that he completely lowballed his million-unit quarterly estimate for iPad sales while suggesting that the supply constraints may cause Wall Street to balk at AAPL's premium price if the company can't catch up with demand over the summer.
GameStop: Console shortages likely not fixed until summer
On the same conference call earlier this week in which it talked about its new rewards program, GameStop Executive VP of Merchandising, Tony Bartel, said that stores currently experiencing Wii and PlayStation 3 shortages probably won't find relief very soon. While the retailer is always bugging Sony and Nintendo for more units, Bartel said that GameStop "could sell a lot more hardware than what we have on both the PS3 and Wii platform," and that situation probably won't change until early summer of this year. He did say that the Wii is due for a re-supply first, but he believes that both Nintendo and Sony are "still scrambling to catch up from the surge" of the last holiday season. But a shortage like this isn't unprecedented -- as we get closer to summer, we'll probably see new inventory appearing on shelves, ready to go home to a caring gamer.
Sony: PS3 supply to be 'tight' over coming months
Sony's senior director of corporate communications Patrick Seybold issued a statement after last night's NPD numbers for January, explaining that the company's flagship console may be a bit difficult to find at retail over the next few months. "We're working very hard with our retail partners to meet consumer interest, but the demand is tremendously high for the PS3 and we expect tight inventory in the coming months," Seybold notes in the statement. As this is the first we've heard about any sort of PlayStation 3 hardware shortages, we followed up with Seybold to make sure he wasn't only warning about future supply issues, but also explaining January's sales of the console. He told us: "Yes. The strong demand carrying through the holidays was evident and early in the month we [knew] there was going to be limited supply of the PS3 at retail in January. We're working closely with the retail channel to meet this demand, but expect tight supply for the coming months." The upcoming supply issues may also be a result of Sony's "upcoming line up of the industry's most anticipated games" -- games like Heavy Rain, God of War 3, and ModNation Racers. Seybold additionally points out that "this momentum is fueled by a stellar holiday" and the recent releases of games like MAG and BioShock 2. We here at Joystiq have yet to see the shortages at our local brick-and-mortars, but feel free to let us know if you do!
Nintendo: Replenishing Wii supply will be a 'challenge'
Nintendo has responded to Joystiq's inquiry into the current Wii supply issues, with Nintendo of America's Senior Director of Corporate Communications Charlie Scibetta telling us, "In the short term, replenishing Wii inventories will be a challenge." He continues, "But we are doing everything we can to satisfy consumers looking to purchase a Wii system." Analysts have already pointed out that Nintendo's console sales, despite being record-breaking, could have been stronger had there been more Wii to go around. What makes this situation even stranger is the report from early December that Nintendo actually reduced Wii production going into the holiday. For the astounding amount of success the Wii has brought Nintendo, there appears to be some serious cognitive dissonance between how much the company thinks it should produce of the console and the actual demand.
Component shortages lead analysts to forecast rise in prices of personal electronics
As you might well know, we're not the biggest fans of analyst blather, but this piece of research by Gartner is backed by some substantial numbers. The FT reports that DRAM prices have recently risen by 23 percent, followed closely by LCD prices with a 20 percent jump, both in response to the financial crisis the whole globe seems to be suffering from. Because the effects of recently renewed investment in capacity building won't be felt for a while, we're told to prepare for higher prices throughout this year -- a significant combo breaker from the previous decade's average of around 7.8 percent drops. Oh well, let's just cling to the encouraging signs for the future and ignore this bump on the road to gadget nirvana. [Thanks, Ben W]
Amazon says PS3 Slim already facing supply shortages, Sony disagrees
Been holding off on that PS3 Slim pre-order, waiting for Sony to tell you that this whole PS2 backwards compatibility issue was just a big misunderstanding, and of course Sony will keep trying its best to reintroduce PS2 compatibility into the PS3? Well, you might want to rethink that strategy, cowboy, because Amazon is warning of "shortages of this product across the US." It's already limiting Slim sales to one per person, and has a more lax five-Slims-per-person strategy in the UK. Meanwhile, Sony in Europe is saying not to worry, since it has "trucks and trailers" of the new console already on the road . We just don't know who to believe these days, but if you're not prepared to wait past September 1st for a crack at the Slim, you've got some deciding to do. Read - GamesIndustry.biz Read - MVZ
Hardware shortages blamed for Wii's underwhelming December
Let's make this clear: Wii sold a helluva lot of units in North America during December. 2.15 million consoles in a single month is a number Sony and Microsoft can only dream about right now, but there's no doubt that the figures weren't as grand as expected. He who is Pachter predicted the console would clear the 3 million mark, only for the platform to fall short by 850,000 units.Why the lower-than-expected sales? As usual, analysts reckon they have the answer: more of those accursed hardware shortages. EEDAR's Jesse Divnich and Deutsche Bank analyst Jeetil Patel both believe demand outweighed supply for the third December running, with Divnich stating the Wii would have sold "north of 4 million units" if more consoles had been produced in time.Phew, panic over! Wii's not the next N-Gage or anything![Via Joystiq]
Rumor: Best Buy holding back Wiis
Still stuck for a Wii this holiday season? Worried that little Jonny and Jenny will regard you as the WORST PARENT OF ALL TIME come Xmas morning?Then know that there is still hope. A Go Nintendo tipster claims that his local Best Buy is clinging onto its Wiis until December 14. Come Sunday, the store will allegedly offer them out to customers with games bundled on top -- including Mario Kart Wii, which you should buy anyway, because it's a riot.Sure, it's only a rumor, but a perfectly plausible one: Best Buy did something similarly sneaky last year. If you're still in the hunt for a Wii, we'd recommend a Best Buy visit this weekend.
Looking for a Wii? Try Walmart.com
If you're on the hunt for a Wii this holiday season, then Walmart.com just might have you covered. The retail giant will supposedly be selling "tens of thousands" of Wiis starting now. If you're looking for just the console, or a bundle package, Walmart will have several different options available to consumers, starting with the console alone ($250) on up to a bundle package featuring Wii Fit ($460). Of course, now that the word is out, there might not be much time for you to nab one of your own. So we suggest you get to it.[Via Joystiq]
