Doug Bowser: Nintendo “Had Some Time To Build Inventory” For Switch 2 In The US and Worldwide

Nintendo of America President Doug Bowser has shared reassurances about Nintendo Switch 2 supply that will be available at launch, not only in the US, but also around the world.

Bowser was interviewed by Steve Kovach for CNBC. Kovach did help lead Bowser through the interview, by asking him if Nintendo made plans to avoid the years of supply constraints that the Nintendo Wii and PlayStation 5 suffered. Kovach also pointed out that Nintendo doesn’t have to worry about pandemic restrictions for the Switch 2.

Bowser confirmed that Kovach was correct about these points, and then he said this (edited for clarity):

“That’s correct, that’s correct. And we’ve had some time to build up inventories on a global basis. They’ve even landed already in some places in the United States.”

This seems to line up with rumors we had reported on over the past two years about Nintendo’s moves to prepare and commence manufacturing of the Switch 2. While Nintendo officially confirmed they had ramped up manufacturing of the Switch 2 last February, rumors about manufacturing date to as far back as November 2024.

While some fans jumped the gun, assuming that announcements would be coming soon, we can now formulate what bigger picture Nintendo had in mind. Maybe they could have announced the Switch 2 as far back as November 2024. But they deliberately held it back a few months for the purpose of building up stocks, and giving them time to distribute their consoles around the world.

Kovach also asked Bowser about the limitations of the pre-order program that Nintendo announced at launch. Nintendo limited pre-orders to users who had a Switch Online membership for at least 12 months, and played at least 50 hours as logged on the console.

You can read more about it here, but Bowser was quick to clarify that pre-orders won’t actually be limited to the website. In Bowser’s words:

“First of all, you’re speaking about our pre-order program that we have through Nintendo.com. And our motivation there with the number of hours played was really to reward our most loyal players. To give them a chance to queue up first and have an opportunity to purchase the product.

Tomorrow, we’re going to be meeting with our retail partners, who will have their own pre-order programs. So our goal is to meet the demand that’s going to be out there for Nintendo Switch 2.”

As you may already know by now, Nintendo has cancelled pre-orders on April 9, and that’s true of them and their retail partners, like GameStop. Unfortunately, there are now some unexpected factors that may change how gamers can get the Switch 2, or truly, any video game products and services in the future. But at the very least, we have Nintendo’s assurance that their consoles are in the US, and around the world as well, ready and waiting to finally come out to the public.

You can watch the CNBC interview with Doug Bowser below.