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Europe and US help Nintendo profits soar News

Wii DS News by Robert Purchese

7 May, 2009

Nintendo has reported record-breaking annual sales, but revealed a weak Japanese underbelly in the process.

Operating profit was a massive USD 5.64bn for the year (ended 31st March), which is put into perspective by EA's entire revenue of USD 4.1bn. Net profit worked out at USD 2.8bn, up 8.5 per cent year-on-year. That climb is not as dramatic as previous years, but Nintendo puts that down to the "significant deterioration" of the worldwide economy.

The bread was largely won by rampant DS and Wii sales. The handheld shifted a whopping 31m units over the 12 months, while the Wii shifted 26m units, breaking the 50m lifetime barrier worldwide along the way.

Software stars were Wii Fit and Mario Kart Wii, which sold an enormous 16.7m and 15.4m copies, respectively.

But while North American and European numbers are up year-on-year, Japanese figures are down across the board.

Japanese DS hardware sales fell by 37.5 per cent and DS software sales by 20.1 per cent. Similarly, Wii hardware sales fell by 46.2 per cent and Wii software by 12.8 per cent.

Those figures follow nine weeks of PS3 dominance in Japan, which Nintendo is not worried about because there is a whole year to rectify the situation.

The numbers in brief:

Nintendo DS - Hardware (units: FY08-FY09)

  • Japan: 6.4 million-4.0 million (-37.5%)
  • North America: 10.7 million-12.1 million (+13.1%)
  • Rest of the World: 13.3 million-15.1 million (+13.5%)

Nintendo DS - Software

  • Japan: 39.9 million-31.9 million (-20.1%)
  • North America: 65.2 million-81.8 million (+25.5%)
  • Rest of the World: 80.6 million-83.6 million (+3.7%)

Nintendo Wii - Hardware

  • Japan: 3.9 million-2.1 million (-46.2%)
  • North America: 8.2 million-13.0 million (+58.5%)
  • Rest of the World: 6.5 million-11.0 million (+69.2%)

Nintendo Wii - Software

  • Japan: 14.9 million-13.0 million (-12.8%)
  • North America: 64.9 million-113.6 million (+75.0%)
  • Rest of the World: 39.8 million-77.9 million (+95.7%)
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Comments: 1-13 of 13 in total

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20charactersmax
07/05/09 @ 09:53
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mrmrc84
07/05/09 @ 09:58
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No wonder they can't put down the price of any of their consoles!
Golgo
07/05/09 @ 10:17
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Seeing as a lot of revenue was generated by Wii-Fit, Nintendo should be thankful that us Europeans and Americans are a bunch of fatties.
Edited 1 times, most recently on 07/05/09 @ 11:29
GamesConnoisseur
07/05/09 @ 10:45
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We are just among the 'Rest of the World' according to Nintendo/EG article above?!
paulf
07/05/09 @ 10:53
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sony and microsoft still think they are winning the console war though ...
wayneh
07/05/09 @ 11:16
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Trouble is nearly everyone has got a Wii/DS so who are they going to sell to?
Xerx3s
07/05/09 @ 11:52
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Just curious, any reason why it fell so sharply in japan while the rest of the world is growing?
makeamazing
07/05/09 @ 12:09
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Probably because Japan is a small country and the rest of the world... well you get the idea. They have peaked in Japan, perhaps they think they can sell more with the DSi, get users to replace currently owned units for new ones.
Xerx3s
07/05/09 @ 12:13
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Yeah but the size doesn't really matter with percentages right?
Genji
07/05/09 @ 13:01
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Anyone who says that "nearly everyone" has got a Wii or DS clearly underestimates just how many people there are in Japan. There are millions upon millions of people who do not own one. So there are still buyers out there.
Xerx3s
07/05/09 @ 15:16
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I think only sellers is more accurate.
IronCladChicken
07/05/09 @ 16:22
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If sales continue to sag in Japan after the motion plus release, Nintendo can just start releasing Wii's in different colours - It's been a while since I've seen them.
Gaol
07/05/09 @ 17:05
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I wish they would use even 1% of those profits to develop some decent new games for their long term fans.

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