Do you remember the last price cut Microsoft did for the Xbox One? It seems to have been a success, but not in the way Microsoft would have wanted.
Microsoft as a whole reported $ 1.8 billion in revenue, a drop of 4 percent year on year. Xbox was a major contributor of that loss. The Xbox 360 and Xbox One combined sold a mere 1.6 million units, down from 2 million. It also did not help the company that the console sold at a lower sales price on average.
While Microsoft did not give a break down for each console, the evidence seems to point to lower sales for both. NPDs recent reports confirmed that the Xbox 360 sales have taken a nosedive.
For the Xbox One, the data is not as direct, but no less clear. Microsoft launched the console at $ 500, and it stayed that way from late 2013 to early 2014. Microsoft cut Kinect to sell a $ 400 SKU to compete with the console at the same price point. Lastly, the price dipped down to $ 350 last October.
While it seemed unlikely for the Xbox One to match initial sales given the price drop, it’s clear that the price drop did not help sell Xbox One units at all, any more than it did for the Wii U. Perhaps price really is not a factor in the success of consoles nowadays, given how different the approaches for the PlayStation 4 and the 3DS have on this.
As for Team Xbox? Phil Spencer doesn’t seem to discouraged, as he recently disclosed plans to show more 1st party games at E3. Do you think this is a strategy that will work? Share your thoughts with us in the comments.
