Sony released its Q1 FY15 (ending June 30, 2014) financial results today, reporting a net profit of 26.8 billion yen (about $263 million), which is a rise of 757% from last year, a boost provided mostly by the PlayStation 4’s big numbers so far.
Looking solely at the PlayStation division, sales rose 95.7% to 257.5 billion yen (about $2.5 billion), which is thanks to the PlayStation 4 and increased PlayStation Plus subscribers as a result of the PS4 launch. Additionally, operating income was 4.3 billion yen (about $43 million), which is a huge jump from the loss of 16.4 billion yen in the same quarter last year. They attributed this gain to the PS4, though it was “partially offset by a decrease in PlayStation 3 software sales.”
As per usual, Sony didn’t give exact sales figures for each individual console, but they did reveal that combined sales of the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 3 totaled 3.5 million. Comparing this to the Xbox brand in Q1, the Xbox One and Xbox 360 only combined to ship 1.1 million units.
Here’s the breakdown of how the PlayStation division did during Q1 FY15, with Q1 FY14 in brackets:
- PS4/PS3 – 3.5 million (1.1 million)
- PS Vita/PSP/PS Vita TV – 0.75 million (0.6 million)
- Software – 85 million (68 million)
The forecast for the entire FY15 remains the same as it did back in May:
- PS4/PS3 – 17 million
- PS Vita/PSP/PS Vita TV – 3.5 million
- Software – 390 million
When talking about the outlook for the rest of the fiscal year, Sony revealed that PS4 hardware costs have been reduced:
Sales are expected to be higher than the May forecast primarily due to the strong performance of the PS4. Operating income is expected to be higher than the May forecast primarily due to PS4 hardware cost reductions.
