Supply issues have hampered the rollout of the latest generation of video game consoles. Even now, almost two months after the Xbox series X and Xbox series S. released, Microsoft is still trying to meet demand and has reportedly reached out to chipmaker AMD to speed up production.
AMD produces the GPU and CPU for both consoles, so if it is able to bring out its chips faster, Microsoft could theoretically produce more consoles by extension. As noted by VGC, Microsoft is working as hard as we can to pump out more systems and has even reached out to AMD for help, Xbox chief Phil Spencer said in a recent appearance on the Major Nelson Radio Podcast hosted by Xbox Live program director Larry Hyrb
‘I get a few people [asking], ‘why didn’t you build more? Why didn’t you start sooner? Why haven’t you shipped them before? ‘ I mean, all those things, ”said Spencer. “It’s really just a matter of physics and technology. We don’t stop them: we build them as fast as we can. We have all the assembly lines. I was on the phone with last week [CEO and president] Lisa Su at AMD [asking], ‘How do we get more? How do we get more? ‘ So it is something we are constantly working on. ”
In November, Tim Stuart, Xbox’s chief financial officer, predicted that problems with Xbox delivery could last until at least April. By 2020, Microsoft will have an estimated 3.3 million copies of its more expensive Xbox Series X per Statista, and sold approximately 21,000 Xbox Series X and S units in Japan at launch.
G / O Media can receive a commission
However, Microsoft isn’t the only one struggling: competitor Sony is facing similar shortages for its next-gen console, the PlayStation 5, which also relies on AMD for its GPU and CPU.
“But it’s not just us, I think 2020 will really do justice to gaming,” Spencer told Hyrb. “Obviously, PlayStation 5 is very tight. If you look at AMD and Nvidia’s graphics cards … there is just a lot of interest in gaming right now and console sales are just a sign of that, game sales are a sign of that, and there’s a shortage of hardware. “
However, chip makers like AMD and Nvidia already have their hands full with their own delivery problems. AMD struggled to meet demand for its Ryzen 5000 series processors last year. There is a global shortage of GDDR6 memory Reportedly helped bottleneck production for AMD’s Radeon RX 6000 and Nvidia’s RTX 3000 series GPUs, and things aren’t expected to improve until February. That could also slow production of next-gen consoles as both the PlayStation 5 and the Xbox Series X and S use GDDR6 RAM.
So it’s uncertain whether AMD could even comply with Microsoft’s call to action. Of course, the coronavirus pandemic and the rush to distribute vaccines could also affect global supply lines. And then there are the scalpers scoop available stock to sell them at a markup. A recent analysis estimates that eBay scalpers have made more than $ 82 million in sales since September through the resale of next-gen consoles and AMD and Nvidia chips.