After months of rumors, Nintendo itself revealed earlier this year that it is preparing a successor to the hugely successful console, the Nintendo Switch. The original announcement said that the company is planning to at least unveil the new hardware, called the Switch 2 by fans until an official name comes through, before the end of the current fiscal year, which is March 31, 2025.
Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa reiterated the company"s intentions to stick to this time frame in an online press conference today (via Reuters). However, while recent rumors say that the Switch 2 announcement will happen before 2025, analysts think otherwise.
"Making an announcement this year has gotten quite difficult ... You would not want to divert attention to an upcoming console in the middle of the critical year-end shopping season," says Toyo Securities analyst Hideki Yasuda, with pressure mounting on Nintendo to keep its share prices stable.
The Nintendo Switch is now eight years old, and the sales downturn for the device is speeding up. The Japanese giant today lowered its sales forecast for this fiscal year from shipping 13.5 million consoles to 12.5 million. The operating profit outlook was lowered by 10% for the same duration, too, coming down to $2.4 billion.
"For a platform that is in its 8th year in the market, both hardware and software enjoy stable demand and brisk sales," says Shuntaro Furukawa. "But sales so far fell short of our original projections. Taking into consideration their sales in the first half, we revised our forecasts for both hardware and software, and that led to the earnings revision."
The company"s last fiscal year saw a significant upturn in revenue thanks to the success of games like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom as well as the Super Mario Bros. Movie. "There were no such special factors in the first half of this fiscal year" to make a difference like that again, the company added.