Lost opportunities

It is XBox 360 time again! I am one of those gamers who couldn't get his hands on this shiny new gaming machine. So you could call it a rant from a disgruntled gamer. But now that I have done some thinking around the whole thing, I see many signs of how MS executed (executing) it so badly. So here are my points:

1. Does supply does meet demand?: Microsoft set launch date and I am fairly certain that it predicted the demand as well. But it failed to provide adequate supply of units for the holidays. It has been a month since the launch and I still don't see this damn thing on the store shelves.

2. Make hay while sun shines: This season is the best time of the year when people make impluse buys or not worry about spending their dollars that much (I sure is one of them) or want to gift someone that hottest items in the market to their loved ones. It failed to capitalize on this sentiment or momentum. What is the point of building the hype when there is nothing to benefit on it?

3. Why lose money when you don't have to?: The hardware isn't making money for Microsoft as this story goes. If the demand is so high, why wouldn't/shouldn't it make some money out of these things? I would have expected the initial pricing to be higher so that only the core gamers and people could afford can buy them. Would it have had the effect of reduced sales? I don't think so. I see people buying/selling these things at a minimum of $600 and as high as $1500. I have even made offers to the extent of $675 for a $399 system and was turned down. I would rather see the Microsoft and its shareholders make money out of this demand rather than the people on ebay or others.

4. Why buy the old? If the hype is so high and the demand is so high, why would anyone want to buy the old XBox or its games? In fact, retailers like Bestbuy reported that their game sales is down as much as 12%

5. Why bite more than you can swallow?: Microsoft made another big mistake by setting simultaneous worldwide launch (USA, Europe & Japan) when it couldn't even handle the demand in USA. In fact when people raised these issues prior to launch, Microsoft said it could meet the demands fine but see for yourselves.

6. When there is a choice, there will be some research: With the possibility of the supply not matching demand as late as march of 2006, I am pretty sure that some significant percentage of gamers would choose to wait for the Sony's PS3 launch which is set to second quarter of 2006. When that time comes, I am sure people are going to compare both and make informed decisions based on what they see fits them best (Price/Games/Features etc). So Microsoft has only 4 or so months before it runs into competition and the sony momentum builds. It will be a huge mistake to underestimate PS3 launch when we know what happened to PS2.

I totally see the huge mistakes and all the lost opportunities. I can't stop laughing when Microsoft talks about Asia launch!! Sure it can do it anytime. Because it is all a matter of making few thousand units available and then disappoint the gamers in the other parts of the world and then call it a hugely successful launch.