Will Sony Subsidise The NGP?

Earlier today, the Internet practically exploded with news surrounding the official announcement of the PSP’s successor, codenamed “NGP”. Amongst the truckload of news, which we’re covering here, was a fact-sheet which let on just how much horsepower, voodoo and unicorn horns Sony have managed to cram into their new handheld.

As you can see from the below list, if a futurologist has so much as dreamt about a tech, Sony have shoehorned it into its mobile form-factor with the only thing that appears to be missing is a cookie-making hoverboard.

• CPU: ARM® Cortex^TM-A9 core (4 core)
• GPU:SGX543MP4+
• External Dimensions: Approx. 182.0 x 18.6 x 83.5mm (width x height x depth)
• Screen: 5 inches (16:9), 960 x 544, Approx. 16 million colors, OLED – Multi touch screen (capacitive type)
• Rear touch pad: Multi touch pad (capacitive type)
• Cameras: Front camera, Rear camera
• Sound: Built-in stereo speakers, built-in microphone
• Sensors: Six-axis motion sensing system (three-axis gyroscope, three-axis accelerometer), three-axis electronic compass
• Location: Built-in GPS, Wi-Fi location service support
• Keys / Switches: PS button, Power button, Directional buttons (Up/Down/Right/Left), Action buttons (Triangle, Circle, Cross, Square), Shoulder buttons (Right/Left), Right stick, Left stick, START button, SELECT button, Volume buttons (+/-)
• Wireless communications: Mobile network connectivity (3G), IEEE 802.11b/g/n (n = 1×1)(Wi-Fi) (Infrastructure mode/Ad-hoc mode), Bluetooth® 2.1+EDR ?A2DP/AVRCP/HSP

These days, smart phones which feature touch screens, multi-core processors, front and rear cameras, motion sensors, GPS and of course mobile 3G and WiFi chip-sets cost anything up to £600. They are generally only affordable  thanks to the heavy subsidies offered by mobile phone operators trying to hook you into a long term monthly contract. So, just how much could the NGP cost?

Speaking to Eurogamer, Sony’s Andrew House said

I can’t put a ballpark on it in terms of figures, but what I would say is that we will shoot for an affordable price that’s appropriate for the handheld gaming space. Ideally we would want to have our hardware be profitable, in addition to our software, we’ve experienced both sides and we know which one we like to be on.

However, a source told Eurogamer that “Sony will make a loss on each unit”, which isn’t hard to believe if Sony want the above spec at an affordable price point. With no official price announcement all talk is little more than educated guess work but at a spec that, in this writer’s opinion looks like it could be closer to £400 than the psychological £200 barrier, it looks like Sony themselves may need to dig deep so users can get their hands on the Next Generation Portable gaming goodness.