Nintendo profits rise to $6.2bn ahead of quiet year

gamesindustry.biz:

Nintendo has released its latest financial results, showing a strong year in terms of net sales and profits thanks to the success of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Super Mario Bros Wonder and The Super Mario Bros Movie.

For the full year ended March 31, 2024, the platform holder reported net sales rose 4.4% to ¥1.7 trillion ($11 billion) and gross profit up 7.8% to ¥954.3 billion ($6.2 billion). This is despite declines in both hardware and software sales.

The company is expecting a much tougher year, forecasting a 20% drop in net sales for the twelve months ended March 31, 2025.

In a social media post released alongside these results, Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa said the successor to the Switch will be announced "within this fiscal year."

Here's what you need to know:

Full year ended March 31, 2024

Forecast, year ending March 31, 2025

Nintendo Switch sales dipped 12.6% year-on-year, with 15.7 million units shipped to retail. The OLED model continued to make up the bulk of these at 9.32 million (up 1.1%), while the standard model shipped 3.86 million (down 37.1%).

Just shy of 200 million Switch games were sold during the financial year — 199.7 million, to be exact, down 6.7% when compared to the previous fiscal year.

Despite the dip in both hardware and software, Nintendo told investors that sales are "steady for a platform in its eighth year."

Looking specifically at the previous quarter — three months ended March 31, 2024 — Nintendo sold 1.96 million Switch units (down from 3.06 million in the same period last year), and 35.72 million games (down from 41.85 million).

Digital revenues rose 9.4% year-on-year to ¥44.3 billion ($286.6 million, up 9.4%), thanks to a rise in both sales of download games and add-ons as well as a boost in Nintendo Switch Online revenue.

The platform holder reported the Switch had 123 million annual playing users over the course of the year, up from 116 million last year.

Mobile and IP-related revenues delivered the most growth, up 81.6%