Nintendo Expecting Another Full Year Loss

Nintendo are performing below their expectations.

Nintendo have drastically cut the number of Wii U and 3DS units they expect to sell by the end of the current financial year, and they’re also expecting to report another full year loss.

The estimated sales figures for the Wii U have been cut from 9m to 2.6m.  Meanwhile, they are now expecting to sell 13.5m 3DS units, down from their estimated figure of 18m.  In addition, operating income, originally expected to be 100 billion yen (£586m) in profit, is now expected to be a loss of 35 billion yen (£205m).

The launch of Super Mario 3D World and Wii U hardware bundles have helped, but they are still way short of expectations.

“In particular, sales in the US and European markets in which we entered the year-end sales season with a hardware markdown were significantly lower than our original forecasts, with both hardware and software sales experiencing a huge gap from their targets,” Nintendo president Satoru Iwata explained today.

“In addition, we did not assume at the beginning of the fiscal year that we would perform a markdown for the Wii U hardware in the US and European markets. This was also one of the reasons for lower sales and profit estimates.”

The 3DS specifically didn’t meet overseas sales targets, according to Iwata.

“Using the US market as an example, Nintendo 3DS became the top-selling platform in the last calendar year… however, the estimated annual sales of the Nintendo 3DS hardware remain significantly lower than our initial forecast at the beginning of the fiscal year.”

Source: Eurogamer