Bloomberg Japan reported that Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE) plans to ship ten million PlayStation2 units worldwide by the next fiscal year. To break the numbers down specifically, the company is expecting to ship four million systems in Japan and three million in North America and Europe respectively, starting this fall.
The company also announced that it had shipped 1.2 million units as of March 28 and plans to ship a total of 1.4 million units by the end of this month. Among the 1.4 million units, 36 percent (which is about 500,000 units) had shipped via the company's online shopping web site JP.PlayStation.com. Japanese telecommunication company NTT DoCoMo will invest in the online shopping web site and will provide content such as stock-market-trading services for those using the cellular-phone service i-Mode linked with the Sony PlayStation2. SCE plans to release the network adapter and hard drive for the PS2 and then initiate its online game service in 2001.