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Xbox One and PS4 to ship 5-6 million this year

Xbox One and PS4 to ship 5-6 million this year

Fri 25 Oct 2013 2:26pm GMT / 10:26am EDT / 7:26am PDT
Hardware

Baird analyst gives Microsoft's console the edge during launch window, expects shortages of both

With the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 launching next month, industry watchers are beginning to handicap the horse race. Baird analyst Colin Sebastian is the latest to weigh in, telling investors this morning that he expects total worldwide shipments of the two consoles to come in between 5 million and 6 million units this year.

He projected each console to ship 1.5 million to 2 million units in North America, and 2.5 million to 3 million worldwide. Despite the identical ranges, Sebastian suggested the Xbox One may outsell the PS4.

"While many forecasts still give an edge to Sony/PS4 in North America sales, we continue to expect similar or even slightly higher sales of Xbox One by the end of the launch window," Sebastian said.

Sebastian also noted that while both systems are currently listed on eBay at healthy mark-ups, Xbox One systems are averaging a 60 percent premium over the $500 retail price tag, while PS4s are fetching 50 percent mark-ups over that system's $400 asking price.

"Retailers in our checks indicate there is consumer demand well in excess of supply, as evidenced by fast sell-outs of incremental unit allotments, such as at GameStop," Sebastian said. "Looking further ahead, we still believe a more accurate gauge of new cycle demand should be made after the initial sales window, dominated by core gamer fans."

6 Comments

Sebastian Moss
Editor -in- Chief

PlayStation LifeStyle

57 19 0.3
Considering they'll both likely sell out, it's more about which one has more stock to sell out than random eBay figures.

The problem with using eBay for this, among many other reasons, is that the Xbox One has a special, sold out, Day One edition with cool branding and all, which for many is worthy of the extra premium.

That said, if stock wasn't the deciding factor, my money's on the Xbox edging out sales in the US too, the brand is just phenomenally strong, and its attachment to the CoD franchise can't be understated.

Side note: I miss when headlines that weren't facts used to highlight said flaw in the headline itself.

Edited 1 times. Last edit by Sebastian Moss on 25th October 2013 5:30pm

Posted:5 months ago

#1

David Serrano
Freelancer

280 245 0.9
It will be interesting to see if Microsoft discloses the percentage of consoles being used to play games vs. exclusively used as a set top device.

Posted:5 months ago

#2

Paul Jace
Merchandiser

768 1,001 1.3
Considering they'll both likely sell out, it's more about which one has more stock to sell out than random eBay figures.
Pretty much. The 360, PS3 and Wii all sold out at launch in the US. Imagine if each system had an extra 1 to 2 million units for sale at those times. I think this will be similiar. Regardless of which system everyone wants, I think that, despite the $400-$500 prices units are going to be scarce for both systems thru out November-December and both Sony and Microsoft are going to wish they had an extra million units they could get out to store shelves as quickly as possible.

What remains to be seen is how long these sell outs will last. Will they last thru out Janauary or even further? Hopefully not because theres going to be a big need for systems in the spring when the second wave of games hit(Titanfall, Watchdogs, Destiny) and I expect further sell outs at that point because any of those games have the potential to be system sellers, especially the first two.

Posted:5 months ago

#3

Michael McGrath
Studying IX63

Queensland University of Technology

17 4 0.2
VG Chartz has recent pre-order figures, and the PS4 is approximately 200K units ahead at 725,000. Battlefield 4 has almost twice the pre-orders on PS4, with about 430K units in total, while CoD is ahead by a small 30K margin on the Xbox One, totalling 625K on both consoles. Most other multiplatform games have more units pre-ordered on PS4, such as Watch Dogs with 150K on PS4 and 95K on Xbox, or Destiny at 89K and 66K, or AC4 at 213K and 138K respectively. This suggests that the PS4 will definitely have a much larger US launch than the Xbox.

However, considering CoD pre-orders have gone up 100K on Xbox One in the past two months, compared to only 50K on PS4, it does seem that for the CoD gamers, the Xbox is still the console of choice. After the console launches, the gap will likely begin to close for hardware sales, as more CoD fans flock to the console their friends are using. There's a good chance that by the time Treyarch's next effort rolls around, boosted by the earlier Titanfall release, the Xbox One may actually take the lead.

VG Chartz August figures: http://www.vgchartz.com/article/251266/ps4-vs-xbox-one-pre-order-totals-to-august-24th-2013/
VG Chartz October figures: http://www.vgchartz.com/article/251359/ps4-vs-xbox-one-us-pre-orders-update-xbox-one-gains-ground/

Edited 1 times. Last edit by Michael McGrath on 26th October 2013 1:56am

Posted:5 months ago

#4

Greg Wilcox
Creator, Destroy All Fanboys!

1,993 902 0.5
Ugh. eBay should NEVER be used as a barometer for anything, as launch console and game sales are ripe for hundreds if not thousands of fraudsters trying to do anything from sell empty console boxes, bricks or busted systems in new console boxes, bogus pre-order pickup receipts and so forth and so on. That and some will overcharge for shipping if the price they want isn't met to keep the difference, or pull many other things that have happened where buyers end up unhappy with the "deal" they paid too much for. That and MS, Sony and Nintendo don't see a dime of that eBay money at all.

It's not the MOST honest marketplace, that's for sure (says the guy who's had an account there for about 12 years or so, yeesh)...

Posted:5 months ago

#5

Nick Parker
Consultant

264 124 0.5
I would support a 4 to 5 million combined units sales of both consoles before the year, lower than the above article and also I would expect PS3 to shade Xbox One due to more markets (Scandinavia, Benelux, Eastern Europe, Middle East) open on day one for PS3 and a significant market share improvement from PS3 in the USA and UK, the two Xbox strongholds. One of the best sources of data is IHS Screen Digest. Severe market allocation strategies will dominate the two inventory constrained consoles until at least end of March - a real balancing act of getting the right amounts in the right territories.

Posted:5 months ago

#6

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