This week, Microsoft celebrated its one year anniversary in Japan. Celebrate might actually be too strong a word, considering that the console has had rather moribund sales numbers in the Asian country over the last 12 months. The total number of Xbox One units that sold in Japan over the last year totals 54,813. If that number does scare you when it comes to the future of the console, keep in mind that’s quite a bit less than what the Xbox 360 did in its first year on the market in Japan.
Even worse is that it’s not as though the Xbox 360 was kicking butts and taking names when it hit the Japanese market either. There are a number of factors that people have pointed to as the reason why Microsoft can’t get a foothold in that market. The biggest and most obvious reason used is that Sony dominates the market because Sony is the “home team.” While that might have been the case when the Playstation first got released, Dualshockers points out that Japanese youth are plenty willing to try foreign electronics products these days.
It’s possible the solution is as simple as not having a marketing team that has really managed to find the pulse of the consumer over there. Whatever the reason, the one year anniversary celebration isn’t much of a celebration with those weak sales numbers. Those numbers also aren’t going to help Microsoft hit its goals of getting Windows devices into two billion hands over the next two years.
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