This is well and truly over for “the fastest-selling console” in history. Although having reached 10 million faster than all the other machines on July 18, the PlayStation 5 must now swallow its ambitions which were to do at least as well as the PS4. Even though the fiscal year is not over, the manufacturer seems to have underestimated the global semiconductor shortage and was only able to release 3.9 million PS5s between October and December 2021, compared to 6.4 million. of PS4 at the same stage of its existence.
As a result, there are 17.3 million PS5s worldwide compared to 20.2 million PS4s at the same stage. Faced with this observation, the manufacturer now hopes to reach a total of 19.3 million PS5s worldwide by March 31, 2022, instead of 22.6 million for the previous objective. Which means that 2 million lucky people will be able to get their hands on a PS5 between January and March 2022, and not one more, despite a busy schedule of big releases.
The lack of availability of the PlayStation 5 also pushes Sony to revise downwards its expected turnover for the whole of the fiscal year, which would still be the largest in its history (21.8 billion euros). euro). In addition, the annual operating profit is revised upwards (2.6 billion euros) thanks to a reduction in selling, general and administrative expenses. Let’s add that Sony sold less than 2 million PS4s throughout 2021, including only 200,000 in the last quarter. The total console park stands at 116.8 million.
48 million PlayStation Plus subscribers
The software figures also did not compare to the last quarter. Sony sold 92.7 million PS5 and PS4 games between October and December 2021, compared to 104.2 million in the same quarter a year earlier. PlayStation Studios productions represent 11.3 million games sold over the period (12% of the total) against 19 million a year earlier (18% of the total). Rather logical: as a reminder, PlayStation studios did not release any new products during this quarter, while the previous year was the year of the launch of the PS5 with titles like Spider-Man: Miles Morales and Demon’s Souls.
Note once again the strong increase in digital consumption: 62% of games sold in the last quarter were downloaded (compared to 53% a year earlier). Another still important statistic, Sony has 48 million PlayStation Plus subscribers, a new record that represents an increase of 600,000 subscribers compared to last year. Enough to forget that the number of active users fell from 114 to 111 million players and that the playing time of these users fell by 20% in December 2021 compared to December 2020.
A record annual turnover despite everything
On the big side, Sony Interactive Entertainment reveals a turnover down (6.2 billion euros) but profits up (718.3 million euros) for the last quarter of the year. This is also the largest operating profit ever recorded by PlayStation between October and December. Once is not custom, the video game is however not the most profitable branch of Sony in this quarter. This title goes to Sony Pictures which, carried by a Spider-Man: No Way Home stratospheric, rolls over other sectors and exceeds one billion euros in profits. As of December 31, 2021, the film with Tom Holland posted an international box office of 1.2 billion dollars (1.7 billion now) against 503 million dollars for the sequel to Venom and a much more modest $31 million for Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City.
Over the whole of 2021, Sony Interactive Entertainment posted a new record turnover of 22 billion euros, up 9%. The same is not true for operating profit, which fell by 21% and represented 2.3 billion euros. A result that the manufacturer could never have imagined at the time when the launch of each new console was accompanied by losses. A time when subscriptions and microtransaction revenue weren’t there to provide a permanent safety net for the builder. Also for the whole of 2021, there are 294.1 million PlayStation games sold, including 95.6 million in boxes and 198.5 million for download. PlayStation Studios games represent 37.3 million games sold over the year.
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