Microsoft: Kinect Is Fastest Selling Consumer Electronics Device In History

That might be a wild claim, but Microsoft chief financial officer – Peter Klein, stated in a conference call that Kinect has sold units quicker than the iPad, PlayStation 2 and any new mobile phone ever made. How can he back up this theory? Well to date, Kinect has sold an amazing eight million units. The device launched in November around the world and that sales figure accounts for the first 60 days on sale. Those sales figures also helped the Microsoft Entertainment & Devices division (headed up by the Xbox 360) to amass a gigantic $3.7 billion in revenue for the final quarter of 2010 – which was an improvement of 55% over figures gathered for the previous year.

This is set against the rumoured half a billion dollars spent on marketing the new device – which couldn’t be escaped over the Holiday season with television, print and web-based advertising running amok. But when the revenues stack up as they have, few could argue with the massive marketing push it got. Console sales also rose 42 per cent growth in the U.S. on the back of 6.3 million consoles sold over Christmas – but this could be also attirbuted in part to the Xbox 360 Slim which came out in June, as well as the new Xbox 360 console and Kinect bundles.

Microsoft claimed 2010 was their biggest in history, but also looked forward to an exciting 2011, with Gears of War 3 as their banner blockbuster and Avatar Kinect being their big new innovation in the pipelines.