I've been harping on this for awhile now. I stated a couple weeks back that the best time for M$ to lower their price would be on the same day that Halo 3 is released. Apparently someone was reading my posts. Now analyst are talking about what I already predicted should happen many weeks ago. If M$ really wants to sell XBox 360's, they should have 2 premium SKU's. One for $350 (or less) XBox 360 Premium and another premium for the regular $399, but include Halo 3 as a bundle. You think those babies won't sell like crazy? If M$ misses the Halo 3 price drop date, they will do it on Nov 22 (2nd Yr. Anniv.) just before the largest shopping day of the year.
http://biz.gamedaily.com/industry/feature/?id=16438
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Report: Microsoft Hints at 360 Price Cut Before XmasMicrosoft executives have been talking about expanding the Xbox audience and getting more units into customers' hands. Corporate VP Peter Moore said he wants "a solid business with 90 million people." A price cut was strongly hinted at, and one analyst believes it'll happen this September.
According to a report onBloomberg.com, Microsoft is strongly considering its strategy for the Xbox 360 platform and what it can do to maintain its lead. As we stated in our article on the "Keys to Victory", there are two very important elements that Microsoft needs to pay attention to in order to better compete with the Wii - price and a wider array of content for a broad audience.
Bloomberg says that Microsoft will attempt to bring moms to the 360 by adding more family games and overhauling retail displays to make children's titles easier to find. Corporate VP Peter Moore recognizes that if Microsoft continues to cater to the same hardcore audience the company could wind up in the same position as they did with the original Xbox. "If we don't make that move, make it early and expand our demographic, we will wind up in the same place as with Xbox 1, a solid business with 25 million people,'' said Moore. "What I need is a solid business with 90 million people."
"If you don't start building that content and reputation it never comes," added Albert Penello, director of Xbox global platform marketing. "I don't want to be pigeonholed as a hard-core machine."
UBS AG analyst Heather Bellini believes that a price cut is coming this September. Considering that Halo 3 is launching on September 25, that could be the perfect one-two punch for Microsoft and could lead to a major sales spike going into the holiday season. "If they really are going to have a good Christmas games lineup, then they just have to have the largest number of boxes out there so that they sell the largest number of games," added Bellini.
And Microsoft realizes that a price cut may be just what's needed to get those boxes out there. "We are well aware that the sweet spot of the market is really 199 bucks,'' said David Hufford, a director of Xbox product management. "When mom walks into the store and sees she can get a console with a game for $250, she sees it as a $300 value. They've done a good job," he added, referring to the Wii, which he said has a "strong value proposition."
Indeed, price is possibly more important than anything. And despite the fact that the PS3 sells for $600, Sony should recognize that better than anyone. Their PS2 sold 75 million at or below that magic $199 price tag.
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