Sony Says 4.5m ps5’s Sold – ALL at a Loss!
Mike Sanders / 4 years ago
Ever since the launch of the PS5 back in November, it’s not exactly surprising to see that the console has been in exceptionally high-demand from gamers all around the world. With that being said though, it’s certainly something of an issue that demand is currently massively outstripping supply, but following a report via TechPowerUp, that may not, perhaps counterintuitively, be such a bad thing. Well, not for Sony at least.
Sony Has Sold 4.5M PS5’s
Following the publication of their quarterly earnings report, Sony has confirmed that in just over 2 months since they initially hit retail shelves, they have so far managed to sell over 4.5 million PS5 consoles. A figure that, comparatively speaking, is not dissimilar to the numbers when the PS4 was released back in 2013 and, as such, on the whole, this would appear to generally suggest that the console is well on track to be a huge commercial success. However, on something of a moderate downside to this, and apparently confirming a lot of rumours we heard leading up to the system’s release, every single one of those 4.5 million PS5’s has ultimately been produced and sold at a loss for Sony.
In other words, the cost of making the systems is more than what they are being sold for! – Well, not unless you bought your PS5 off a scalper, but then Sony doesn’t see that money do they?
What Do We Think?
We should note that it isn’t uncommon for gaming consoles to be sold at a loss initially. Why? The general business sense behind this decision is that the company will recoup any potential losses through the purchase of software (games), which requires a license for the system. It’s an indirect means of making money, but it has been proven to work in the past. This does, however, perhaps add to the speculation that Sony may have deliberately throttled the manufacturing of PS5’s during this initial production/release period so that when components prices drop, as they should be based merely on the proxy of age and reduced demand, this will, all going well, at least allow Sony to be able to start breaking even with the physical sale of the consoles.
On the whole, that clearly doesn’t bode well or provide any solution for the millions of people desperate for a PS5 and simply can’t yet find one for sale anywhere other than the Hades that are eBay resellers!
What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!
