Let’s speculate! Several manufacturers have approached Nintendo about producing the Wii’s accelerometer, presumably for less money than current suppliers do. So, a cheaper accelerometer means a cheaper Wii, right?
We need to face the facts that Nintendo is currently selling as many Wiis as it can ship. (It sold 800,000 Thanksgiving week alone, as Sony and Microsoft fought for the scraps.) Since it clearly doesn’t need to cut the price of the Wii, why should it?
They might not need to cut the price, but they could stand to make more than the $6 they’re making off of each console now. Since they don’t make loads of money off of games the console margin is their primary revenue stream, and despite selling like crazy, Nintendo’s profits are about equal to Microsoft/Sony’s, from what I hear.