With the new Wuhan coronavirus recently being declared a global health emergency by the World Health Organization, the affect on the video game industry is beginning to take hold. The Taipei Game Show 2020 was already announced as being delayed to Summer 2020. Now the Nintendo President, Shuntaro Furukawa, has commented on his growing concerns about the effect of the coronavirus on the production of the Nintendo Switch console. [Thanks, Naruki]
Furukawa spoke to Kyoto Shimbun yesterday saying the emergency is “beginning to have more or less an impact on production.” Switch production is largely in China, although some moved over from China to Vietnam in Summer 2019. Furukawa also said that “prolonged problems will affect the product delivery plans”.
Nintendo shares dropped 3.55% on the Tokyo Stock Exchange on January 31, 2020 to close at a three-month low. This comes just a day after Nintendo released their impressive Nine Months Earnings Release.
The three month results saw Nintendo post its highest quarterly profit in 10 years due to strong demand for the Switch console with system sales at 52.48 million units worldwide as of December 31, 2019. The company subsequently raised the full-year sales forecast of the Switch from 18 million to 19.5 million for this fiscal year.
