Couple of hours after Nintendo announced it was revising its Wii U sales forecast for the year from 9 million to mere 2.9 million, company’s CEO Satoru Iwata while addressing audience at an Osaka press conference indicated that the company might consider new business options.
Iwata was spotted saying “We are thinking about a new business structure”.
“Given the expansion of smart devices, we are naturally studying how smart devices can be used to grow the game-player business. It’s not as simple as enabling Mario to move on a smartphone.”
Iwata said that the company won’t be able to continue its business “without winning” and that it was taking a rather “skeptical approach” over the fact that whether it can continue making gaming consoles and games and still stay in business.
So what next?
It is still very much unclear what Iwata meant by ‘a new business structure’. He hinted that he may finally resort to what the company’s investors have been demanding long for years that is support smart devices like the iPhone and iPad.
Sharing and launching company’s popular franchises like Mario, Zelda and Donkey Kong on smartphones and tablets could be an option that Iwata might have meant by saying ‘enabling Mario to move on a smartphone’.
Another possibility would be Nintendo releasing a new hardware combining elements and features of its home and portable consoles into one single device.
