Nintendo's Dunaway leaves as DS, Wii sales crash

Nintendo today said its executive VP of sales and marketing Cammie Dunaway was leaving the company in a possible sign of a shakeup following its struggling game business and competition with Apple. The veteran will exit as of October 1 and plans to take a position outside of the game industry. Nintendo hasn't named an immediate successor.

Dunaway has been an instrumental part of Nintendo's recent successes and took over from now US president Reggie Fils-Aime in November 2007, just as the Wii was beginning to ramp up in earnest and the DS was also relatively unchallenged.

Her departure carries significant timing as it comes while the company is facing a rapid decline in interest. In August, Microsoft's Xbox 360 beat Nintendo for the second consecutive month in a feat almost unseen since the DS and Wii became available. Nintendo's sales have been dropping this year; the DS was especially hard-hit as its sales have almost dropped by half from year to year. It has tried to fuel sales by bundling the Wii with more features but hasn't had much success. The DS may not see significant recovery until the 3DS launches in the fall.

Publicly, Nintendo has been hesitant to pin the decline on a particular cause, but it's widely believed the company views Apple as a threat and has been suffering the most from competition with the iPod touch and iPhone. Apple has been drawing revenue share away from both the DS and Sony's PSP and, according to Apple, is larger in terms of device volume than the DS and PSP combined. The iPod has the advantage of an Internet-only game sales model with much lower prices as well as more advanced hardware and stronger media support. [image via Wired]

by MacNN Staff