Sony has reported a shortage in available PS2 units, recalling a similar incident that went on for several months after the unit was first introduced in 2000. The company revealed earlier today that it was using expensive air-freighting to transport units to the US, feeding a growing shortage in the units on American store shelves. The shortage has been being monitored by the industry for some time, as a recent memo from Shawn Milne (Friedman, Billings, Ramsey & Co. analyst) states:

As expected, PS2 supply remains an issue.We lowered our PS2 hardware unit assumption to 2.75 million in the December quarter from 3.1 million in the year-ago quarter and slightly reduced our PS2 software growth estimate from 10 percent to 8 percent. We believe the PS2 hardware shortfall may limit upside in software sales in the quarter.

American Technology Research analyst P.J. McNealy stated that “The additional costs could cut any margin [Sony] makes on the PS2 unit nearly in half.” He also noted that despite Sony’s efforts to deal with the shortage, it likely will not be enough to prevent similar shortages in all markets. Get ‘em while they’re hot, I guess.