Nintendo's Market Value Briefly Tops Sony's
GameDaily reports on news from Reuters; today for the first time Nintendo outpaced Sony's market value. Note that this isn't Sony's games wing, but the entirety of the Sony corporation. Investor confidence spurred by brisk sales of the DS and Wii pushed Nintendo (briefly) into the top ten earners in the nation of Japan, with such rarefied organizations as Honda, Toyota, and Canon. "Nintendo's shares rose to a record high 46,350 yen in the morning, increasing its overall market value to 6.57 trillion yen ($53 billion), which allowed it to surpass Sony's market capitalization for a time. The company's shares, however, finished the day a bit lower putting Nintendo back in 11th place behind Sony, but still ahead of Panasonic maker Matsushita, whose sales are over eight times larger than Nintendo's. Nintendo's market value closed at 6.39 trillion yen on Monday, just below Sony's 6.48 trillion yen."
Games have been trickling out since most of the game producers are of the wait-and-see variety.
b lishers-shift-from-sony-to-nintendo-271785.php
The Wii's success was soon evident to everyone though and most of the large game makers jumped on the bandwageon. However since games aren't produced in an instant, you'll see an avalanche of games released for the Wii, starting late '07, but mostly throughout, and towards the end of, '08.
News is surfacing that some companies are shifting focus from Sony to Nintendo entirely:
http://kotaku.com/gaming/the-tide/big-japanese-pu
My guess is that this'll keep happening unless/until the PS3 somehow manages to pick it sales up significantly and reach some form of critical mass.