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Microsoft Spends $500m on Kinect
Posted by: coltonfoster | November 4, 2010 | Leave a Comment
I recently read a post on the Marketing Magazine website that outlined how Microsoft was about to spend $500,000,000 on marketing for their newly released Kinect peripheral for the Xbox 360. For those who are not familiar with Kinect (or its earlier codename Natal) it is basically a motion sensing camera and microphone that lets the user control and interact with games and applications on the system. You can pet fake animals or pretend to be an olympic runner without needing any controllers, just your body movements. While this seems like a great idea and revolutionary new technology, the early reviews haven’t been outstanding. Yet, I predict that just like the Wii, Kinect will take off soon enough once enough good games come out for it. Obviously Microsoft is a gigantic company and can afford to spend such a sizable sum, but is it necessary? I’m willing to bet that it is. A large amount of Microsoft’s Q3 2010 profits came from its gaming division and I believe that they want to expand it even further. Apple has succeeded in expanding its business from very few computers to becoming king of the portable world. Microsoft needs something like the Xbox 360 to dominate even further so that their business can diversify. Obviously they should not be worried about their software division – Window 7 sold 7 copies a second since release. However, this large marketing campaign may bring Microsoft back into the spotlight of being cool. Their successful launch of Windows Phone 7 along with the hugely popular new OS makes Microsoft a true leader once again. I don’t mind Apple as a company so this isn’t supposed to be a rant about how Microsoft is so much better…I really think they need to pull their socks up. In Q3 2010 Apple had a 10% US marketshare for computers…over the last few years it had been averaging around 5% with about 2% worldwide. I realize this post has turned into an analysis of Microsoft but I think it is important to understand some of the necessity behind spending so much on marketing for one product. Hopefully as the Xbox 360 and Kinect develop together, Microsoft can grow its marketshare in the console world and continue its successes in the PC and Mobile markets. Because it does not manufacture its own phones or computers, I think that Microsoft needs to put more emphasis on working with manufacturers to ensure their devices are good enough and have the same appeal that Mac products do. I <3 Microsoft but come on guys.