Nintendo slash Wii production in face of drooping sales

We can remember a time when parents were driven to horrible tears in the vain hope of finding a store with a Nintendo Wii in stock; now the company is apparently slashing production of the console after its recent dreary financial performance.  According to Nikkei (subscription required), Nintendo has informed two Japanese suppliers that it intends to reduce the Wii production, a move that has apparently had an extreme impact on those suppliers' own profits.

In fact, Nikkei claims that the firms – Mitsumi and Hosiden – are facing more than 50-percent reductions in net profits.  Wii sales dropped 43-percent in the last financial quarter, with Nintendo selling just 5.75m of the consoles, and prompting the company to scale back their end-of-year financial predictions.

[via Kotaku]