Nintendo Notes A Rise In Research And Development Costs As ‘Switch 2’ Looms

File this one in a box labelled “Huh, makes sense”, because Nintendo has confirmed that its selling, general, and administrative (SG&A) expenses rose by 2.4% year-on-year during its latest financial report.

“Okay, so?”, you might ask, and it’s a fair question. While certainly not a particularly noteworthy announcement on its own, Nintendo has confirmed that one of the main reasons for this is due to a rise in research and development costs. As we know, the successor to the Switch will be revealed at some point before the end of FY2025, so it’s not unreasonable to assume that the company is now all-in on development for the new console.

Here’s exactly what it had to say:

“Selling, general, and administrative expenses (SG&A expenses) rose by 2.4% year- on-year to 97.9 billion yen, mainly due to a rise in research and development expenses and an increase in foreign currency-denominated expenses upon conversion to yen, caused by the depreciation of the yen. The ratio of SG&A expenses to sales increased by 19.0 percentage points to 39.7%, due to the year- on-year decline in sales.”

Big shock, huh, Nintendo is working on Switch 2 stuff. Still, it’s a pretty clear indication that the company is just about ready to put the Switch out to pasture and reorganise its internal efforts to focus on the upcoming console. Now, as to what exactly this research and development currently entails, we don’t know, but we’d hazard a guess that it’s mostly for software development at this stage. We’re merely speculating, but we reckon the console itself is pretty much done and dusted now.

Regardless, it’s an exciting time for Nintendo fans as we inch closer to the end of FY2025 (March ’26). Switch sales may be down, but there’s something big looming on the horizon… We’re ready for it. Are you?