With the Wii consistently selling out as soon as it hits store shelves, and the DS continuing to sell like hotcakes, 2007 was definitely Nintendo’s year. According to Daniel Ernst of Hudson Square Research (whose fiscal 2009 outlook we also covered here and here), that momentum will carry Mario and co. right through 2008 as well.

For fiscal year 2008 (which ended this March), Sony sold 9 million PS3 units globally, Microsoft sold 9.5 million Xbox 360s and Nintendo sold 18.5 million Wiis. For fiscal year 2009 (ending next March), Ernst forecasts that Microsoft will sell 11.2 million units of the Xbox 360 worldwide, Sony will sell 12.5 million PS3s and Nintendo will sell 23 million Wiis. ….

….With the DS dominating all hardware sales worldwide, the continued growth of the portable sector will also be a boon for Nintendo.

“With 69.8M Nintendo DSs and 38M Sony PSPs on the market vs. 24.3M Wii’s; 20.6M Xbox 360’s; and 12.6M PS3’s, the addressable market for Portable Game systems is significantly greater than for Consoles,” Ernst pointed out. “However, because the price points of portable systems are significantly lower than for consoles, total portable revenues account for just 28% of industry sales – masking the segment’s greater contribution to earnings.

Here are the total sales predicted for each system this next year:

Wii 23 million

PS3 12.5 million
360 11.2 million

For two years this would put the Wii’s total at 45 million. The DS predictions contradict, Hiroshi Kamide predictions posted 3 post below. It will be interesting to see what really happens.

Link, Link