Anyone still think Wii U will "win" "next gen"?

[Rangers]

These are not sales, naturally some people rush to equate the two.

Just NPD added up for April-May-June (37.7K+35K+42K) is 115K hardware sales for Wii U. And that's only USA not "Americas". Clearly Nintendo still working off some overshipments.

Dont get me wrong of course, Wii U sales are abysmal.

A more reasonable guesstimate of current continuing sales is 35k/month USA, maybe 20k/month Europe (just based on anecdotes that it's doing even worse in EU, and knowledge that typically EU~USA market size), and well, this exercise is shot to hell by the fact Wii U just saw a Pikmin 3 spike of sorts in Japan (to a whopping 15-20k last two weeks) but previous level was about ~6K/week, 24K/month in Japan. So continuing sales maybe 35K+20K+25K+10K fudge factor/other=90K/month, X3=270K/Quarter? Maybe even that is a little low, maybe 300K/quarter.

That literally probably used to be a bad week for DS at the height of it's popularity.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

With competition from next-gen consoles, the next holiday season may be brutal to the Wii U.

It looks like the Wii U may stagnate at around 4 million consoles sold worldwide, which is:

- Less than half of Sega Saturn
- Less than half of Dreamcast
- Less than a quarter of Gamecube
- Less than 1/6th of Nintendo 64

- Less than 5% of Wii



I'm wondering if the number of PS4 preorders is far from the number of Wii U sales.

These are not sales, naturally some people rush to equate the two.

Who rushed? Nintendo?
You think Nintendo rushed to equate what?

The worldwide sales of “Wii U” hardware and software were 0.16 million units and 1.03 million
units respectively mainly due to the release of few key first-party titles this quarter to strongly drive the hardware sales.

 

[Cjail]

At this point I doubt WiiU will reach the 9 million mark.

 

[Rangers]

sales!=shipments, regardless if large corps sometimes use the term interchangeably.

corps mean "sold to retail", not consumer.

 

[Rangers]

At the point I doubt WiiU will reach the 9 million mark.

yes, that projection seems beyond insane right now.

 

[oramay]

Of course, I'd imagine more than 10k Wii U was sold at retail level in "other" region in the 3 months. That doesn't make their shipment numbers less memorable though.

These are the kind of numbers for which stories will be told, articles will be written and Hitler videos will be made.

 

[liolio]

So we are looking at the worse sales for any system in what 2 decades?
Nintendo management sucks hard imo...

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The worldwide sales of “Wii U” hardware and software were 0.16 million units and 1.03 million units respectively mainly due to the release of few key first-party titles this quarter to strongly drive the hardware sales.

'Strongly' is not really the adverb that comes to mind. I wonder what the copy-writer's reaction to writing these press releases is, after years of Wii and DS super-numbers? Do they feel in any way false trying to use the same sorts of terms for what are clearly terrible sales? An honest press release would not be good PR!

 

[DuckThor Evil]

'Strongly' is not really the adverb that comes to mind. I wonder what the copy-writer's reaction to writing these press releases is, after years of Wii and DS super-numbers? Do they feel in any way false trying to use the same sorts of terms for what are clearly terrible sales? An honest press release would not be good PR!

Maybe the "release of few" and particularly the "few" in there means that due to only few releases the sales weren't driven by them.

 

[HolySmoke]

That's atrocious and not altogether surprising by now. The system is plain overpriced and lacking in value. Bundling NSMBU would alone possibly have saved them from this.

 

[Cjail]

More bad news for WiiU.

 

[BRiT]

More bad news for WiiU.

Most of the tidbits...

The reason is quite simple. The closing factory was responsible for manufacturing the console’s Embedded DRAM, that is quite properly defined the “life stone” of the console.

The production of the 1 cm-wide semiconductor for Nintendo was responsible for more than half of the load of the factory at peak times, but the slow sales of the console determined a reduction in demand and a gap in the usage of the machinery and personnel, forcing the plant to run at a loss.

Nintendo told the Japanese Magazine Weekly Diamond that “the closure of the plant won’t have immediate effects on the production of the Wii U”, but the outlook of things isn’t too positive for the future.
Nintendo could try to contract another company to produce the component, but there are circumstances that make it difficult.

According to a Renesas executive the production of that semiconductor was the result of the “secret sauce” and state-of-the-art know-how part of the NEC heritage of the Tsuruoka plant, making production elsewhere difficult. In order to restart mass production in a different factory redesigning the component may be necessary.

In light of the situation an increase in the production costs of the console seems very likely on the medium and long term due to the shift of production to a different location and to the possibility of a redesign of the hardware. One thing is for sure: the Wii U really can’t can’t get a break as of late…

 

[BRiT]

Alright, got some more tidbits from GAF:SporeCrawler, where they auto-translated another news article: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=74676967&postcount=146

Seems like there's more restructuring of the manufacturing side. Likely no immediate impending doom for Nintendo WiiU other than increased costs/expenses for making the bits.

Tsurumaru Tetsuya president the same day , the press conference in Tokyo said, " a strong structural reform is essential ," said to improve profitability. Tsuruoka plant dealing with ( large-scale integrated circuit ) for game consoles a system LSI, Kofu plant to produce power semiconductors for PC this time , become a closed object to new (Yamanashi Kai city). I also close part of line ( Otsu ) Shiga factory. To form a circuit of semiconductor both a " pre-process " factory.

Renesas had announced plans to reduce sequentially factory in 18 locations in July 2012. The sale of the four plants so far. Currently, the subject to close the factory now the company has it's closed five plants, some lines it is two plants. It is expected to close within three years at the latest either. In addition to about 2700 people who work in a closed factory line to relocation, to recruit the early retirees.

In addition to aggregate to other plants of Renesas and delegate Taiwan product body path manufacturing semiconductor contract manufacturing companies ( foundries ) largest , etc. (TSMC) the products to be produced in the factory line to close It is thought to be more competitive by reducing the production base management costly and divert management resources in the design and development However , the effect on revenue of the series of structural reforms were not disclosed.

Was closed for game machines and equipment for electronics Center; I think excellent selection of businesses with leading-edge technologies, automotive products and energy-saving technologies in industrial applications, such as, "strong technology focuses on going" (sakuta Chairman). Also advancing Asian and emerging customers and cultivating. Sakuta Chairman said resolutions 'must be globally will survive"for customers.

 

[AlphaWolf]

At current selling pace they might already have a supply that will last a year or two so plenty of time for them to get manufacturing back on track.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

At current selling pace, they won't need any more manufactured...

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Could Renesas be hurting because of lower-than-expected orders for the Wii U?

 

[Grall]

At current selling pace, they won't need any more manufactured...

Is that being brutally honest, or just brutal? I dunno. It's scary talk all the same though.

It makes me wonder, with the wuu's current, extremely low world-wide installed base, can even nintendo themselves be profitable, developing and releasing big-budget titles like the new zelda and whatnot? We probably don't know the development cost of these titles (is ninty releasing such figures in their financial statements?) but it's bound to be substantial. Japan is not a cheap country to live and work in to begin with, and you'd think nintendo devs would be fairly well-paid...

 

[BRiT]

Could Renesas be hurting because of lower-than-expected orders for the Wii U?

They absolutely are. Its stated in the first news link that lower orders than expected have made the new fab unprofitable, hence the downsizing and reorganizing. I think they were expecting Wii-like sales numbers, which never happened so far.

 

[Exophase]

I guess we can finally put to bed any doubt that it was Renesas manufacturing this.

I may have expected Nintendo to funnel a large amount of money into Renesas to prevent this from happening, but I guess they're not that invested. They really should have thought twice about going for an eDRAM heavy design dependent on an already floundering company, it's little wonder why MS went for eSRAM.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Is that being brutally honest, or just brutal? I dunno. It's scary talk all the same though.

It was slightly tongue-in-cheek, but thinking about it, Nintendo have to be in a pretty tough situation with this. How many chips can they realistic order off a fab? The numbers currently would be very few, such that the fab probably won't want such a small run (I'm guessing) and the price will be high, making the box even more expensive for Ninty. Should they bother to make more and try a new push on the Wii U? Or would this event be a factor to consider an 'abandon ship, save our money, reinvest it elsewhere' strategy? There must be some reasoning in the board room to that effect, cut your losses, even if it doesn't happen. It's certainly a strain the platform could do without!