NPD Expects PS3 Sales to Jump 40-60%

SCEA's Eric Lempel has already told IndustryGamers that Sony is anticipating a "nice uptick" in PS3 sales, thank to the new $299 price point and introduction of the slimmer model. It would appear that The NPD Group agrees. Talking with InformationWeek, NPD's industry analyst Anita Frazier said that with the new price point, Sony will finally start attracting more price conscious consumers.

"The $299 price point is important to getting to a point where the next segment of price-conscious consumers can jump into the market and it most certainly will re-energize sales of the platform," she said. "We would expect to see in the range of a 40% to 60% unit sales increase when September sales are reported."

Looking at the last two reported NPD data periods (June and July), PS3 hardware sales have averaged about 143,000 units monthly. A 60% jump in sales from that approximate sales level would take PS3 sales in September to around 228,000 units. Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter recently told us that Sony's ability to pass and remain past the 200,000 sales mark will be the real "acid test."

As Frazier points out, however, software is the key.  "Content is still the key motivator of a hardware purchase decision," she said. "Other systems might too take a price cut, so there's a lot playing into which system tops sales any particular month."