Revenue and profit fall at Nintendo

Nintendo’s net profit for the nine months ending December 31st slumped 31.9 per cent year-on-year to 40.55bn.

Net sales fell 3.9 per cent to 425.66bn. However, Nintendo has now already hit its full year net profit target of 35bn. Operating income for the period was up 34.4 per cent at 42.49bn.

In the final three months of 2015 the company sold a further 1.87m Wii U consoles and 3.6m 3DS units. In the last nine months Wii U shifted only 3m units and the 3DS 5.9m. Lifetime Wii U sales now stand at 12.6m, with software unit sales reaching 79.3m.

For comparison, PS4 has sold 36m units and the Xbox One in the region of 19m. Both of these machines were released a year after Wii U.

The best-selling Wii U game of the period was Splatoon, sales of which have now hit 4m units.

2016 promises to be a year of change for the company. Its first smartphone title, Miitomo, is scheduled to arrive in March while details of its next console, the NX, are expected some time in the first half of the year.