Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. (SCEI) said that it would delay the European release of its highly-anticipated PlayStation 3 game console to March, 2007, as a result of insufficient supply of Blu-ray disc drive components. Still, the firm stressed that it would succeed in shipping 6 million game consoles till March 31, 2007. "The revision of the launch date in the SCEE territories is caused by the delay in the mass production schedule of the blue laser diode within the Sony Group, thus affecting the timely procurement of key components to be utilised in," an official statement by the company reads.
Ken Kutaragi, the head of SCEI, said the machine would still be launched in November in the U.S. and in Japan and the only affected regions are Europe, Russia, Middle East, Africa and Australasia. Mr Kutaragi blamed the European delay on problems in mass producing elements of the high-definition Blu-ray disc drives in the machines, BBC reports. Sony PlayStation 3 console is based on the Cell processor developed by IBM, Sony and Toshiba, the RSX graphics chip by Nvidia Corp. and will be equipped with Blu-ray optical disk drive, a hardware part, which is merely available today.
Sony still said it plans to deliver 6 million of its game consoles to the market until the end of its fiscal year (March 31, 2007), the same amount of game machines it planned to have shipped till the aforementioned date.
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News source: Xbit Labs
