A Japanese Nintendo spokesperson confirmed to Reuters that some Nintendo Switch production has been moved from China to Vietnam. This was reported on last week, however it has now been officially confirmed by Nintendo themselves. The reason is quite simple – taxes. The United States of America and China are currently in a trade war. Nintendo, Microsoft, and Sony all manufacture some of their products in China, which isn’t a good thing with this trade war. As a result of it, The United States of America’s President Trump is considering a potential 15% increase on a couple of things, one of which involving Video Game Consoles. This would drive all costs up, so Nintendo is preparing to avoid it by starting to move some production to Vietnam.
TOKYO (Reuters) – Nintendo Co Ltd (7974.T) plans to shift part of the production of its Switch gaming console to Vietnam from China to diversify manufacturing sites, a spokeswoman at the Japanese video game maker told Reuters on Tuesday.
The move would make Nintendo the latest company to relocate production out of China amid a Sino-U.S. trade war punctuated by tit-for-tat import tariffs spanning industries.
Nintendo, which outsources almost all Switch console production to contract manufacturers in China, plans to make the partial shift to Vietnam this summer, the spokeswoman said.
The shift is aimed at diversifying risks and not to escape the impact of potential tariff hikes by Washington on products imported to the United States from China, the spokeswoman added.
If this goes through, prices of video game consoles could increase dramatically. What are your thoughts on this? Let us know on Twitter!
