IndustryGamers - Informing the Games Industry

Xbox 360's Natal Costs Just $50, says Pachter

Posted February 22, 2010 by James Brightman

Last October, Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter took an educated guess, stating his belief to IndustryGamers that Microsoft's Project Natal would sell for around $50 at launch. Now, in a recent episode of Pach Attack on GameTrailers, Pachter claims that the manufacturing cost for the motion sensing camera is indeed just $50 and Microsoft is likely to sell it at cost to entice as broad a consumer base as possible.

"My guess is for Natal, which is really important for them, they're going to price it at or below their cost," he said. "Talking to my hardware specialist colleagues at Wedbush, it's about $50 in cost. Now I may be wrong, and I know we're going to get flamed by 13-year-olds with PhD's in Engineering who know a lot more about hardware than we do, who'd say maybe it's going to be seventy bucks, but I'd be very surprised if it was more than $79. I really think it's going to be $50."

Pachter added that Microsoft needs to sell as many Project Natal cameras as possible, and then make back the money on games specifically for Natal; and ideally, the motion sensing camera will lead to further Xbox 360 sales too. Project Natal will be launching this holiday (as will Sony's motion controller). Microsoft Game Studios' Phil Spencer recently admitted that Project Natal is a "huge investment" that's "fraught with risk."

[Thanks 1UP]

James Brightman has been covering the games industry since 2003 and has been an avid gamer ever since the days of Atari and Intellivision. He was previously the EIC of GameDaily Biz.