It’s no secret that the PlayStation 4 is very difficult to find on store shelves right now, and according to Sony, that won’t be changing for quite a while.

PlayStation UK and Ireland boss Fergal Gara recently spoke to MVC and admitted that the performance of the console has been well beyond their initial expectations, and hopes that there will be a steady supply of the console before summer.

“I can’t work it out precisely. But based on what I’ve seen so far, I think it is going to be tricky until around about April. You might get a fortnight or a week here or there where it is more available, but we should be back to free supply by about April,” said Gara.

“That’s our best guess. It might be a little earlier than that, or it might be a little later. But we’ll get there.”

Gara also spoke about the success of the console, saying: “PS4 pre-orders were obviously a strong indicator of what was going to happen, but they were so big that we were pinching ourselves and wondering if people were pre-ordering in more than one place, and if some of these pre-orders were real.”

“We were getting numbers we never imagined, let alone seen before. But it proved to be real. How do I reconcile that? I think the world has changed since we launched PS3.”

“The price differential between PS3 and PS4 is not nearly as a big as it was between PS2 and PS3. But you are also talking about a public that has become used to regular technology upgrades on reasonably expensive devices, like tablets and smartphones. So there is a comfort level with upgrading that meant consumers were ready earlier and there was a pent-up demand that we couldn’t anticipate. It’s been a pleasant surprise.”

My Opinion

I believe his predictions, given how hard the PS4 has been to find since launch. I wouldn’t be very surprised if it took longer than April, in all honesty. Hopefully they get it in good supply soon though, so everyone that didn’t pre-order will get a chance to buy one.