Nintendo on sell-in of Switch hardware, sales up in all major regions
This information comes from Nintendo’s financial results explanatory material…
Previously, we have addressed sell-in, or the number of sales from Nintendo to retailers, but we would like to turn the discussion to sell-through, which is the number of sales made from retailers to consumers. This graph shows quarterly sell-through for the Nintendo Switch family. In all major regions, sell-through from January through March was higher than that of the same period in the previous fiscal year. In the Japanese market, the release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons drove hardware sales greatly, with console sell-through for the week of release reaching levels above weekly sell-through during the holiday season.
• Annual sell-through of the Nintendo Switch family in Japan during this fiscal year increased 33% over the previous fiscal year, with sell-through of 5.06 million units. The North American market saw a 20% rise over the previous fiscal year, to 7.67 million units. The European market saw a 19% rise over the previous fiscal year, to 5.37 million units.
• In the fourth quarter, the proportion of sell-through for Nintendo Switch Lite to the entire Nintendo Switch family was higher than that of sell-in. This is because inventories for Nintendo Switch Lite, which was just launched last September, were relatively plentiful at the start of the new year in markets outside of Japan, and sell-through for the system grew significantly together with that of the flagship Nintendo Switch both before and after the release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
• Although the spread of COVID-19 impacted production and shipments in some regions during this fiscal year, the scope was limited. Nintendo Switch has been gaining momentum throughout the year, and has achieved widespread expansion compared to the previous fiscal year.
