In 2020, each PS5 restock was a mess. In 2021, nothing has changed. In fact, the PlayStation console has gotten harder to buy. Demand has remained steady. As a result, scalpers continue to poach each PS5 restock with bots capable of gobbling up stock. Meanwhile, restocks are less frequent than they were in 2020, likely due to the fact that retailers drained their stock to zero during the holiday season. Unfortunately, the situation is probably not getting better anytime soon.
According to Sony itself, the shortage isn’t going to end this year unless demand declines, and right now demand shows no signs of slowing down. Speaking to investors, Sony CFO Hiroki Totoki confirmed he and the company can’t do anything to increase supply. Not only is the semiconductor shortage not going anywhere, but there are “other factors” contributing to the scarcity. Totoki doesn’t dive into these factors, but one of them may be the global shipping crisis right now. Whatever the case, Sony is aiming to sell more than PS4 in the coming months.
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“As I said earlier, we’re aiming for more sales volume than the PS4, but can we drastically increase the supply? No, that’s not likely. The shortage of semiconductors is one factor, but there are other factors that will impact the production volume. So, at present, we’d like to aim at [beating] second year sales of 14.8 million, which was the second year of PS4.”
Sony leaves the door open for supply to increase in 2022, and this may happen, but according to a variety of experts and those that would know, there may be supply issues until 2023. Some may think this will be alleviated by demand lowering over time, but that’s not how consoles work. Demand is only going to increase as more must-have games release, especially if those games can’t be played on PS4. Right now, there’s hardly anything of note that is both playable on the PS5 and not playable on the PS4. Yet, demand is through the roof.
For what it’s worth, Totoki notes that Sony may change the design of the console if the shortage of semiconductors continues. How it could change the console to alleviate the reliance on these components, remains to be seen, but apparently, it’s something that’s being evaluated.
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