Pioneer: Sony to Ship 4–7 Million PlayStation 3s in First Year

It looks likely that Sony Computer Entertainment will announce its intention to ship between four and seven million PlayStation 3 hardware sets in the first year that the new console hits homes around the globe. Pioneer senior vice president of electronics Andy Parsons has dropped some interesting hints as to what very well could be Sony's anticipated Year One userbase in an interview appearing on the old skool pages of The Digital Bits

It would seem that Pioneer is understandably upbeat about the chances Blu-Ray has of capturing the home theatre market, with the PlayStation 3 leading the charge into the living room of the everyday consumer.

“The PS3 is going to represent an almost overnight population explosion of Blu-ray capable players,” said Parsons. “That's not something that's really happened before. The PlayStation 2 helped, because that came well down the road after DVD launched, but it did help to get a lot of players out there. But this is something new. The PS3 is launching right at the forefront of Blu-ray Disc. If Sony ships the kind of numbers we expect them to this year, that will provide a very rapid growth of players out there hungry for titles. We've been hearing between 4 and 7 million units could ship. And if you look at PlayStation Portable, with UMD discs, everyone is shocked at how many titles have shipped for that platform. And they're selling as well or better than the game software. So I think Sony has proven that they can drive a new video format like this with their gaming platforms.”

A grounded assertion for sure. UMD didn't exist before the PlayStation Portable. Now it does, and sells well enough for movie publishers to turn a profit, albeit heavily relying on a C-list back catalogue in many cases.

Speaking of the cross-format, seemingly endless appeal of some movies, Parsons quips, “If and when Star Wars ever comes out in high-definition...(laughs) I don't think I even need to finish that sentence...”

High-definition Star Wars... we hadn't even thought of that. Hopefully they'll drop the racial stereotyping and go back to making models out of old milk cartons and bits of string, and then remaster the whole caboodle in 1080P.