AMCP Tech Blog

This morning, Sony held a press event to explain some of the rumors hanging over the doubtful PlayStation 3 launch. Sony's Ken Kutaragi was onstage explaining that Sony plans to ship the PS3 simultaneously in Japan, Europe and the U.S and they are planning to ship over 6 million units by March, 2007.

Why so late? Sony blames a DRM bug in the Blu-Ray drive. However, Nathan Weinberg thinks that Sony is hiding something, arguing that they should have shipped developer kits by now, instead of the intended month of June, 2006. My bet: pricing. The parts going into the PS3 are going to expensive, so Sony is waiting until the market accepts these new products and the price to make and ship them lessens. Everyday later they wait, the less of the price Sony will have to pay, according to Nathan.

Sony is betting everything on this device. The Xbox 360 showed that there are other key players in the market, willing to compete for market share; and Microsoft isn't so much as a push-over anymore. Not only that, but Sony has to make up the market share they lost. The PlayStation is what put Sony on the map, and if they can't exceed their plans of 6 million units, they're in a lot of trouble.

So, when is the PS3 expected to ship? Try November 1-10 and will cost you minimum price of $425.60 or 50,000 JP YEN. Now, what Microsoft should do is drop the price of the 360 right before the PS3 launches.