IDC expects Nintendo Wii to become market leading game console

Framingham (MA) - Nintendo has convinced IDC analysts that it will be capturing more than one third of the game console market by 2008 and surpass its two rivals. However, IDC does not believe that any of the three consoles will be able to dominate the segment.

More than three months after the launch of the Playstation 3 and the Nintendo Wii, analysts appear to agree that Nintendo has what it takes to outship Sony and even Microsoft, which has a solid one-year lead over its third-generation console competition.

IDC is the latest market research firm to jump on the train, saying that Nintendo is broadening the video game audience with the Wii : "Nintendo has designed its latest hardware and software to be more inviting and fun, and less intimidating for non-gamers including those who may never self-identify as a gamer," IDC said. The firm expects Nintendo capture a little more than a third of the worldwide market by 2008, rising slightly above Sony’s PS3 and Microsoft’s Xbox 360.

Meanwhile, the Xbox 360 and PS3 are battling each other in the more traditional video game console segment. "Microsoft is relishing in the PS3’s launch slip-ups, where PS3 supply deficits diminished profits," IDC said.

"With the Wii, Nintendo is abdicating the specification war, leaving Sony and Microsoft to slug it out between themselves for the hardcore market," commented Billy Pidgeon, at program manager at IDC. "We believe concerted efforts to broaden the appeal of videogames beyond the traditional enthusiast/hardcore base will deepen the industry’s penetration. This is good news for an industry that seemed to be receding last year due to over-saturation of the core base."

IDC indicated that the third-generation console market is vastly different from the preceding market that was dominated by the Sony PS2 and trailed by the Xbox and the Gamecube. The market research firm projects the 2008 game console market to be divided almost evenly between Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony : "None of the three new consoles will dominate the market in the next five years like the PS2 dominated last cycle. However, Nintendo’s Wii will outship and outsell the 360 and PS3 in 2007 and 2008," IDC believes.