On August 26, 2019, Brazil received the news that Sony will cut the prices for PlayStation 4, PS4 Pro, PSVR, and its accessories. The consoles themselves will drop $200 BRL (about $48 USD), which means the regular PS4 has dropped from $2599 BRL to $2399 BRL (from $628 to $580). It still sounds crazy expensive to us, but this price drop puts the PS4 in a more affordable range for Brazilians. However, along with the price drop, Sony confirmed the company is no longer producing PS4s in Brazil.
MeuPS4.com, a Brazilian PlayStation news site, reached out to a Sony representative to confirm what, at the time, it felt was a rumor. The representative did indeed confirm it. “About the national production, in fact we no longer have consoles made in Brazil,” the Sony rep said (Portuguese translated via Google translate).
The news site’s theory is that this is due to the recent tax reduction the Brazil Federal Government imposed upon Sony. This tax reduction is also the reason for the new price drop. Therefore, people assume that it’s possibly more affordable for Sony to import consoles into the country, instead of producing them. The site also pointed out that Microsoft recently took a similar stance with its Xbox One X, in regards to importing vs. producing.
However, that’s just one possible theory. Another possibility is that this is one of Sony’s first steps into moving toward the PlayStation 5. Since it’s cheaper for the company to import PS4s into Brazil, instead of producing them, why not stop production now and pave the way for the new generation around the corner?
It’s true that we’re all looking for little tidbits of confirmation that the PS5 is coming any day now, much like we all do when it comes to confirming Half-Life 3. But considering Sony has always produced their console products in Brazil for that region, this does seem to be a huge step toward rolling out the red carpet for the PS5.
[Source: MeuPS4.com via Reddit]
