Kinect exceeds Japanese expectations with 26,000 sales

Slow and steady may not win the race for Microsoft, but it does get its foot caught in the sliding doors (take your shoes off, please)...

Ah well, at least it's moving SOME units. I wonder how many were shipped there? Not much more than the installed base, I hope (or else there will be a LOT of dusty Kinects in a warehouse converted into mini heater/emergency grill/survival flashlight combos in a year or so..,

Posted:2 years ago

I think it will be interesting to see how it sells over the next few weeks, as the 360 S sold about 15,000 in its first week in Japan then very quickly slid back to about 2000 per week. I would not be surprised if Kinect follows a similar pattern.

Posted:2 years ago

Is there any proof that the "1m sales" is sales to consumers, rather than shipped units?

At least, I trust Media Create that its reporting "sales to consumers" - I'm sure they 'sold' a lot more units to retailers.

Posted:2 years ago

How many 360 are in Japan? 1.5M? That would mean Kinect is adapted by one out of 57 owners. If that is really are proportional sales, then the U.S. there should be around 400k units in consumers' hands. That is based on rather old numbers regarding the 360 install base, meaning one million sold in the U.S. is not implausible.

Posted:2 years ago

From an investors point of view i don't see why they even bother trying to sell in Japan. Their culture is based on loyalty, and MS's rivals are all Japanese. it would take huge marketing campaigns and costs that simply wouldn't be returned to sell an acceptable amount of units in Japan.

Posted:2 years ago

There are 45m Xboxs installed globally. So 1m Kinects sold out of 45m Xboxs is hardly a stretch. And then there's people like me who have never had an Xbox who bought the bundle so we're an extra bonus.

Edited 1 times. Last edit by Graham Simpson on 26th November 2010 2:05pm

Posted:2 years ago

"Their culture is based on loyalty, and MS's rivals are all Japanese" that doesn't seem to be a problem for Apple

Posted:2 years ago

@ Marc Kent you obviously never read the Wired article on Why the Japanese Hate the iPhone

While Apples market share has improved over the last year since the article was written Apple isn't everyone's darling in Japan as they are in the States.

Posted:2 years ago

Apple's products do appeal to a slightly different demographic though and they will run into problems of their own soon enough down to their age-related policy on the Book Store.

Posted:2 years ago

@ Andrew: Well, that kind of doesn't explain the success of the MSX (Microsoft X) console and it's assorted variants throughout Japan back in the day. If you think about it, that could be seen as the "original" Xbox (har har)... ;P

Posted:2 years ago

3 million before end of calendar year is very plausable but I have to say I am very disappointed by the lack of marketing push for Dance Central on TV and in the mainstream media. That game alone should be driving sales of Kinect.

Posted:2 years ago

James: I've seen several ads for Dance Central on TV, and I don't spend that much time watching, so my perception was completely the opposite. Interesting if those that watch more telly are finding it less marketed?

Posted:2 years ago

I've not seen any adverts for Dance Central, although I don't watch a great deal of non-BBC (or 4OD) telly.

I did see a couple of adverts for the Michael Jackson Experience game last night though, as well as EA Sports Active 2 which they seem to be pushing quite hard.

Posted:2 years ago