Sony drastically cuts PS3 launch allocation

Tokyo (Japan) - Problems with the production of Blu-ray’s blue laser diode forced Sony to cut the launch availability of its next generation video game console Playstation 3 from 2 million to 500,000 units worldwide, according to report published by AP today.

In spite of the production problems, Sony is sticking to the 17 November launch in the U.S., as well as 11 November in Japan. However, the severe shortage has caused Sony to push back the release date in Europe from 17 November to March of 2007. In the U.S., the amount of PS3 units available at launch will be a mere 400,000. Japan will get the remaining 100,000.

Rumors have been floating around for months that there were problematic production issues for the PS3, but Sony had flatly denied these allegations, up until last month. However, because of the shortage of Blu-ray components, the company had to reduce on their original production forecast.

Sony is now predicting 2 million units to be released by the end of the year. Originally, the firm had planned to ship 4 million units by 31 Dec. Sony believes it will able to catch up by March of next year and still meet the 6 million unit mark worldwide by then.

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