Today, during Sony’s quarterly conference call for investors and analysts, chief financial officer Hiroki Totoki talked about the launch of PS5.
According to Totoki-san, the company predicts to record its highest profit in PlayStation history this fiscal year despite the hardware transition, as the profitability structure of the business has changed dramatically due to the expansion of network services.
With the 4.5 million PS5 units shipped by the end of December, Totoki-san added, Sony is on track to match its goal of 7.6 million units by the end of March, despite not being able to fully meet the demand from customers.
That being said, Sony is continuing to do everything in its power to ship as many units as possible to customers who are waiting for PS5.
Due the stay-at-home orders and the launch of PS5, a “very high level of user engagement” has been reached. The cumulative PlayStation game time in December was approximately 30% higher year-on-year.
As of the end of December, 87% of PS5 users were subscribers to PlayStation Plus, which is considered an “extremely high level.”
Totoki-san also mentioned that Sony had more games at the launch of PS5 that at any previous console launch in the company’s history, and they have sold well.
For instance, Marvel’s Spider-Man Miles Morales recorded an estimated sell-through (to customers) of 4.1 million units by the end of December.
Sony intends to enhance the appeal of PlayStation Network’s services offering.
If you’d like to learn more about Sony’s financial performance (and PlayStation’s successful quarter) on top of official shipment numbers for PS5 and PS4, you can check out our dedicated article.