Maybe they weren't willing to do it without enough* software to back it up.That kind of misses the point; I don't see how letting it languish at pitiful unit numbers and no chance for the software to sell, even if at a better margin, would be better than a great deal more units and better software sales probably than would have otherwise occurred during this period.
Missing the holiday was indeed a huge fuck up for Sony though.
*for Vita low standard.