BusinessWeek: Nintendo Less Innovative Than Microsoft, Sony

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Nintendo is a far less innovative company than either Microsoft or Sony, a new report from BusinessWeek suggests. According to the list, compiled by BusinessWeek and Boston Consulting Group, Microsoft ranks as the fifth most innovative company in the world, with Sony placed eighth and Nintendo checking in much further down the line at number 39.

Numerous other factors beyond the company's consoles and video game divisions factored into their placement on the list--evidenced by the inclusion of companies such as 3M, Wal-Mart, and Procter & Gamble.

That said, it is interesting to note that Microsoft's entry was the only one of the three major console manufacturers to not mention the company's respective video game system. The small text blurb on Microsoft focused on the importance of the "Windows and Office hegemony," without so much as a reference to the company's Xbox brand. Meanwhile, both Sony and Nintendo's entries were almost entirely devoted to their console and software efforts--Sony for its work on the PlayStation 3 virtual world Home, and Nintendo for the motion-sensing Wii Remote that the article claims "shatters the [gamer] stereotype."

Chris Faylor was previously a games journalist creating content at Shacknews.

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  • reply
    May 4, 2007 4:15 PM

    [deleted]

    • reply
      May 4, 2007 4:23 PM

      Xbox Live Marketplace is pretty big. They are really the only sizeable competitor to iTunes' movie/TV show downloads (though their catalog isn't close to Apple's).

      Live Arcade is also very innovative. It came out a year before all the others. Same with Achievements.

      • reply
        May 4, 2007 4:55 PM

        I would agree about Live. Nintendo and Sony talked about such a service for years with nothing on the scale of MS's current offering ever coming to fruition. I suspect because when Nintendo and Sony looked at the financial and technical committment, they both said "whoa!" - MS dug its heels in, and now its forced both Nintendo and Sony to compete in this arena, with MS having a four (or five?) year head start.

    • reply
      May 4, 2007 4:25 PM

      Which products are you refering to?

      As of my knowledge, most products MS has are either products bought from other companies or MS just outright bought the whole company.
      And where did they innovate with their new main product Windows Vista?

      MS is probably the least innovative company of those that are often mentioned in the news.

    • reply
      May 4, 2007 4:25 PM

      Their R&D department is pretty out there, and sometimes they dribble down stuff like the new "ribbon" interface in Office 2007.

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