Brian Farrell, THQ president and CEO, says the industry’s traditional hardware cycle no longer exists.

“We used to always think of this industry as ‘the cycle,’” Farrell said at the Pacific Crest 10th Anniversary Technology Leadership Forum, reports MTV Multiplayer.

“I think the reality now is there are several sub-cycles,” he added, referring to the handheld market, Nintendo’s Wii, and the ongoing battle between Microsoft’s Xbox 360 and Sony’s PlayStation 3.

“It’s hard now to talk about ‘the cycle’ — I think we have to talk about all of the cycles,” Farrell said. “The way we think about it at THQ is we plan our business around each of those platforms, not around ‘the cycle.’”

Farrell’s comments echo those he made on this site last month when he said: “With so many great platforms, each with distinct capabilities reaching different audiences, we believe it is more important than ever before to segment the market when determining our publishing strategy.”

However, at the time he also said, “We are essentially in the second year of what feels like at least a six-to-eight year hardware cycle.”