Sony today cut its PSP shipment target to 9 million units, but that hasn't stopped the company from redesigning its portable, according to American Technology Research analyst P.J. McNealy. In fact, McNealy expects two flavors of PSP next year. [Update: Sony responds]


P.J. McNealy of American Technology Research has today sent us a number of interesting points about Sony's three gaming platforms. Perhaps most notable is that the analyst believes Sony is actively working on introducing a new PSP by next spring.


"Sony will likely introduce a refresh of the PSP hardware line, including a hard-disk drive PSP and a second PSP with no hard drive but with a significant amount of flash memory on board," he said. "We expect these products in Spring 2007, with the pricing for the hard-drive based model at $199 or above, and the new flash-based one below $199."


As for the company's ubiquitous PlayStation 2, McNealy believes that a new limited edition version of the console will be released during this quarter. With the PS3 in short supply and Sony emphasizing the 10-year lifecycle of its PS2, it wouldn't be surprising to see them try to spark PS2 sales this holiday as well with a new limited edition.


With regards to the PS3, McNealy noted that the company's marketing blitz for the next-gen console is getting underway.


"Sony is bulking up its marketing at retail for the PS3, helping to explain the value proposition of the PS3 and putting 15,000 PS3 units for hands-on game play at retail in North America between the end of October and likely Black Friday, the retail day after Thanksgiving. We expect online capabilities to some degree for these boxes as well, which could likely be packaged for display at retail with Sony high-definition Bravia TV sets. We believe this type of vertical packaging is a win-win for both Sony and the retailers such as TGT, BBY, CC and WMT," he said.


[UPDATE] While speaking with SCEA vp of marketing Peter Dille today, we took the opportunity to question him on the analyst report concerning a new PSP.


"I've heard about that, but haven't seen that report. This would fall into the 'We do not comment on rumor or speculation' category, which I know is kind of the canned line, but honestly we don't have anything to add to that," Dille told GameDaily BIZ.


He continued, "What we're thinking is that the PSP has a very long life ahead of it. It's off to a great start; it's one of our fastest growing platforms. All of our consumer research shows that people love the system, and really what we're focused on is educating consumers about a lot of the multifunctionality that exists in the system. People have bought this system primarily to play games, and that's what it is first and foremost, but being able to download content, access the web, access music or videos on the system as well as some of the cool features we talked about tying into the PS3. Those are the things that we're focused on, and we believe that the PSP has a very strong and long life ahead of it. "