Industry analysts Michael J. Olson and Andrew D. Connor of analyst firm Piper Jaffray have stated that the PlayStation 4 will launch during the 2013 holiday season, but with only 50 percent of the volume that the previous console managed due to competition from both tablets and smartphones.
They based the numbers and their analysis on "meetings with industry sources" and don't see a very bright outlook on the launch of the console.
The duo also expect the Wii U to sell only 35% of the volume of the original Wii during its first 14 months due to the console's "disappointing" hardware specifications, which only put it on par with the current generation PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.
They say that the next Xbox will only launch in 2014, behind the schedule of the PlayStation 4 and will only sell 55 percent of the volume that the Xbox 360 had before it. They believe that the next Xbox will be an "an incremental improvement, not a quantum leap," over the Xbox 360.
"We believe console gaming will continue to be a time-share donor to social networks, mobile games and tablets. We, therefore, favor companies with increasing exposure to social/mobile gaming, including Zynga and EA."
