In a recent interview with The Times, Activision CEO Bobby Kotick warned that if Sony’s consoles do not start becoming more profitable then the publisher will have to seriously consider discontinuing support for them.
Over the past 18 years Kotick has taken Activision from being a struggling indebted publisher to its current status as the world’s biggest independent video games company.
The man clearly knows how to run a business, and is one of the few people in the industry that can make threats of this nature and actually be taken seriously.
Activision is behind some of the biggest console franchises in the world, including Call of Duty and Guitar Hero.
“I’m getting concerned about Sony; the PlayStation 3 is losing a bit of momentum and they don’t make it easy for me to support the platform. It’s expensive to develop for the console, and the Wii and the Xbox are just selling better. Games generate a better return on invested capital on the Xbox than on the PlayStation,” Kotick told The Times.
Kotick went on “They have to cut the price, because if they don’t, the attach rates [the number of games each console owner buys] are likely to slow. If we are being realistic, we might have to stop supporting Sony.”
In 2008 Sony made around $500 million off Activision games, a significant figure especially when we consider that Sony’s games division made a loss of $597 million for the year. If it were not for the likes of Guitar Hero, Call of Duty 4&5 and other hit Activision games, Sony’s losses would have been almost double what they were.
This is not the first time that an industry figurehead has publically stated that Sony needs to drop the PS3’s price, but it is arguably the most noteworthy considering that the warning is coming straight from one of Sony’s biggest partners.
Discuss Activision dropping Sony on the forums
Read Sony’s response to Activision threat
