PS3 on 'life support' during troubled launch
Friday, 30 May 2008 08:57
The PS3's launch was almost 'catastrophic' for Sony, said Howard Stringer
Sony's chief executive officer, Howard Stringer, has admitted that PlayStation 3 was "on life support" during its turbulent and troubled launch period.
Speaking at the Wall Street Journal's D: All Things Digital conference, Mr Stringer revealed lofty development costs for the console had nearly been "catastrophic" for his company.
However, he seemed pleased to say that the situation is far from gloomy nowadays, especially after improved sales following the Blu-ray vs HDDVD format war victory.
The future looks bright, apparently, as developers begin to take more of an advantage of the PS3's processing power.
Mr Stringer was quick to denounce rumours that Blu-ray won the format war because Sony paid movie studios the most money.
"We were not in (a) cheque-writing competition," he stated firmly. Despite growing competition from the digital download market, the future of Blu-ray is promising, he continued, citing a reluctance to move away from tried-and-tested physical media products to a purely digital format.