Speaking recently in a financial presentation, Nintendo Co. Ltd. President Satoru Iwata spoke out to investors regarding the recent cut in its annual Wii forecast, expressing his belief that the little console that could would exceed the install base of last generation's mega-popular PlayStation 2.

Nintendo's business has grown rapidly in the past three years. Can we maintain the size of the current business in the next fiscal year and beyond? Or, can we even expand the business in the years to come? These may be the questions that concern you most.

Some are thinking that what takes place in Japan becomes the future indicator for the overseas markets because the gaming population expansion progressed first in Japan. By pointing out the facts that DS sales pace was slowing down in the former half of 2008 and that Japanese sales of Wii did not have the same momentum as the U.S. and Europe have, some say that Nintendo's Wii and DS businesses may peak out during this fiscal year. I think it is true that new information penetrates through the Japanese market very quickly and that Japanese people tend to get tired of something new very quickly. It is also true that the population is smaller when compared with that of other major markets, so it is inevitable that the market starts to feel saturated earlier than others.

He went on to explain that those who were concerned the console had already peaked had based those assessments on the five-year hardware cycles of the past, a belief which Iwata and other video game executives no longer hold, as they don't believe it remains applicable.

Since technology continues to evolve, I do not think any hardware can enjoy eternal life. Someday, we will need a new platform for sure, and of course, Nintendo is always preparing for that. However, now that our customer base has expanded this drastically, we do not think it appropriate to conclude that past platform lifecycle theory can and should be applied to the current generation.

Wii has been selling at industry's record pace so far, and with new customers acquired by the gaming population expansion efforts, it is not impossible for Wii's total sales to exceed the final install base of PS2. Wii still has much more room for expansion. We can expect more sales of software in the next fiscal year than in the current year. With what kind of software is Nintendo going to achieve this goal? Well, it will be shown at E3 to be held in the U.S. this June. -- GameDaily