Japan's Nintendo said on Tuesday it plans to make an announcement about the successor to its long-running Switch console in the financial year ending in March 2025.
Nintendo has extended the life cycle of the Switch device with hit titles like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, with the market focused on the prospects of a smooth transition to next-gen hardware.
The Kyoto-based games company said it expects to sell 13.5 million Switch units in the current financial year as it tries to squeeze more sales from the aging device.
Nintendo didn't offer more details about the new hardware, saying there would be no disclosure at its Nintendo Direct presentation in June.
“Many users will now be reluctant to buy the current Switch as they know the new model will be released sometime in 2025,” said Serkan Toto, founder of consultancy Kantan Games.
Last year, Nintendo sold 15.7 million units of the home portable hybrid device, which launched in March 2017. Nintendo raised its full-year forecast to 15.5 million units in February
The company has made incremental changes to its Switch devices, with sales of the OLED model growing year-on-year, even as broader hardware sales continued their annual decline.
Nintendo expects operating profit to fall by about a quarter this year to JPY 400 billion ($2.6 billion or roughly 21.713 billion rupees).
The company is considered to have a thin portfolio as it holds back blockbuster titles for the successor device with announced titles such as Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door later this month and Luigi's Mansion 2 in June.
Nintendo expects to sell 165 million units of software this year, which would represent a 17 percent decline from the previous year.
“Game development has become more sophisticated, long-term and complex,” Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa said when asked how the market has changed since the Switch's launch.
In the year ended March, operating profit grew 4.9 percent to JPY 528.9 billion.
Nintendo shares closed 2.4 percent ahead of earnings and are up 5.4 percent this year after a recent selloff.
“FY2026 is a very late release window for new hardware,” Toto said.
© Thomson Reuters 2024
