San Francisco (CA) – Sony CEO Howard Stringer has downplayed a rift with Activision chief Bobby Kotick over the latter’s demand for an immediate Playstation 3 price cut.
“He likes to make a lot of noise,” Stringer told Reuters. “He’s putting pressure on me and I’m putting pressure on him. That’s the nature of business.”
When asked about the logic of refusing to reduce prices, Stringer noted that he would “lose money on every PlayStation I make – how’s that for logic.”
Jack Tretton, President of Sony Computer Entertainment America, expressed similar sentiments during a recent interview with Fast Company.
“People are always wanting you to lower your price on hardware. We could’ve come out with a PlayStation 2.5 for $299 or less, and in the first two or three years it would sell extremely well. We feel that we’re sacrificing the short term to pay dividends in the long term,” explained Tretton. “People are having short-term thinking–the platform is not even three years old. It was $599; it’s now $399. The focus on pricing is something we appreciate, but you have to have the conviction and the confidence that you are on the right path for the long term and ultimately you’ll get all the consumers you want.”
As TG Daily previously reported, Kotick had infamously claimed that the PS3 was losing “momentum,” while the Wii and Xbox 360 were “just selling better.” Kotick also insisted that Xbox 360 games generated a higher ROI (return on investment) in comparison with PS3 titles.
“They have to cut the price, because if they don’t, the attach rates [the number of games each console owner buys] are likely to slow,” Kotick told the Times Online. “If we are being realistic, we might have to stop supporting Sony.”
