Bloomberg: PS3 may miss shipment targets

Getting a PlayStation 3 on launch day may be even harder than previously thought. The Bloomberg news service is reporting that Sony's expected shipments of 2 million PS3s by the end of the year (which was halved from previous numbers) might not be so solid after all.

Bloomberg quotes Sony Computer Entertainment America vice president Jack Tretton as saying, "The honest answer is it's more of a target" of the PlayStation 3 shipment figures. "Clearly we've had production issues."

Sony currently plans to ship 2 million PS3s to North America and Japan through the end of the year, and 6 million through March 2007.

Because of issues in manufacturing laser diodes for the system's Blu-ray drive, the company was forced to scale down shipment estimates and delay releasing the PS3 in Europe to 2007. The report did not mention whether launch-day allocation would be affected.