At Sony’s recent Corporate Strategy Meeting and IR Day events, Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO and President John Kodera talked about how the PlayStation 4 was entering the final phase of its life cycle. In the midst of this, The NPD Group’s analyst Mat Piscatella shared his own views on Twitter about when the next PlayStation, the PS5, could launch.
First off, Piscatella predicts a release in Fall 2020 or later. He noted that this represents a “perfectly normal cycle length” and even if the next generation was mentioned, it means nothing when compared to the upcoming content. That being said, he does expect more incremental upgrades to arrive in a quicker fashion, operating on a 1 to 2 year cycle as opposed to 4 to 7 years. This will better reflect what’s happening with other technologies.
Finally, Piscatella spoke about the surprise some had expressed at Kodera’s statements about the PS4’s life cycle. “Current cycle started in 2013. Of course we are entering the final stages of it. We’ve only been through this whole cyclicality thing seven or so times before. How is this even at all surprising.”
Regardless of whether there is a PlayStation 5 in development or not, it won’t be announced at this year’s E3. Sony will instead focus on four core games – The Last of Us: Part 2, Spider-Man, Death Stranding and Ghost of Tsushima. The presser will take place on June 11th.