Nintendo is selling its new Switch console as fast as it can make them, with 1.97 million sold during the quarter ended in June, which the company just..
Nintendo is selling its new Switch console as fast as it can make them, with 1.97 million sold during the quarter ended in June, which the company just reported. The total Switch sales to date now stand at 4.7 million, which is very strong for under two quarters of market availability, and on track to eclipse total lifetime Wii U sales in perhaps under a year, especially if Nintendo has a strong Switch holiday season, and provided it can ramp production to meet demand.
There are good signs that it’s nearing the ability to do just that – stockists including Amazon have been more frequently releasing batches of the console for customers, and they’ re taking slightly longer to sell out than they have been previously, which indicates Nintendo is approaching the right supply and demand balance.
Overall, the Switch and its software sales drove good numbers for Nintendo, including $578 million in gross profit, and $145 million after expenses, vs. a $46 million operating deficit for the same period last year.
On the game side, Zelda: Breath of the Wild remains the top hit for the Switch, with 3.92 million copies sold to date (almost one per console out there) , while the re-released Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is a near second with 3.54 million. Arms is off to a good start with 1.18 million sales, and indications are that Splatoon 2 is also doing well in the early going, which is bound to help Nintendo grow its Switch-derived revenue vs. the console’s earliest days, when there wasn’ t much in the way of top-tier software available for the console.
Nintendo’s 3DS family of products sold basically on par with last year at just under 1 million units (a 1 percent increase year-over-year) , while the portable console’s software sales dropped a hefty 31 percent. The new 2DS XL is coming out later this week, however, and that should boost those numbers, along with premiere releases coming later this year including a Pikmin follow-up and Pokémon Sun and Moon semi-sequels.
