Tag: Sony sales

Sony Reportedly Shifting its Focus to PlayStation From TVs and Smartphones

According to recent reports, Sony is in the process of shrinking down its TV and smartphone business to focus more on gaming consoles. With PS4 sales reaching a 13.5 million milestone, it’s apparently the only division that is generating profits for the company. Following a recent forecast that predicts 30 percent downfall in Sony’s mobile division by next spring, the Japanese giant is now making the PlayStation brand its utmost priority.

A recent report from Reuters revealed that Sony has devised a 3-year plan for a shift that will focus primarily to boost the sales of PlayStation division by 25 percent, while reducing support for its mobile and television divisions. Thanks to the PS4, the company has generated a $265 million profit which compensated for the loss from its television and mobile business.

The Japanese electronics giant has been posting yearly losses that have eventually resulted in the fall of its share price. The PlayStation 4 sales have been so strong that despite facing losses in other divisions, the company’s revenue grew by 7.2 percent. Let’s see how beneficial will this step be for the company.

November 27, 2014
Sony Working Towards Reviving its Ailing Smartphone Business

Sony was once a name that people trusted when they went for electronics shopping. The company had its roots firm in every sphere of consumer electronics. But now, the Japanese giant is in trouble. The slow adoption of technology has pushed it back in several fields in which it earlier led the game, the most prominent example being its TV business. Sony’s other major electronic products, the smartphone family is in serious trouble.

Once Sony had aspired to become the third biggest smartphone company behind Samsung and Apple. This aim, they now realise, was overambitious. Instead, they are now trying to restore their ailing smartphone business.

The company recently posted a loss of $1.2 billion. The continued losses have forced the company to scale back their sales target from 50 million down to 41 million. Presently, Sony’s electronics fort is held up by the successful sales of the Playstation family.

Sony will be putting its focus on three areas: image sensors, video games, and entertainment studio. Sony is also hoping to make gains from its entertainment studio. But currently, the studio is facing a global hack and the stand-off is still in progress. The hackers are threatening to release sensitive documents if their demands aren’t met. This can be a cause of concern for the company as a whole as Sony Pictures is one of the major names of the industry and one of the Sony’s biggest cash cows.

Flagships smartphones from the company such as the Z3 have been appreciated for their features, but they have also been berated for their high prices. It is expected that the company will reduce the number of flagships it releases in a year and also cut back on the affordable smartphone portfolio.

Presently, the main goal of the company is to bring its business to profitability even if that means losing 25-30% of market share in the smartphone business. The company is facing issues in the markets of US and China, which are important for the industry. Sony commands 3% market share in both those countries and will be scaling back its investment in China soon. Plans for the US market are not clear yet.

Sony devices have been appreciated in the past for their quality and device cameras. The company can make a name for itself in the low-end selfie device market while the fad is still on. It can also take the Motorola path and release limited devices in a year but make sure that the devices are universally appreciated.

November 26, 2014
Sony steals the 2nd place spot from Apple in India

Sony India has overtaken Apple in their sales for smartphones in India becoming the second largest mobile phone shipper in 2014. This aggressive movement has been rewarded to Sony thanks to the company’s focus largely on the Rs 10,000-20,000 smartphone space, backed by Rs 300-crore marketing spend.

The number one spot was retained by Korean smartphone giant Samsung with 43% market value share. Sony took second place with 9.1% value share in the Indian smartphone market in the October-December quarter of 2013 against Apple’s 7% share.

This decline in Apple’s sales has been thanks to the company’s decision to withdraw sales of their largest selling unit the iPhone 4, and hence the disappearance of Apple from the under Rs. 20,000 price bracket. Apple did relaunch the iPhone 4 specially for the Indian market but failed to gather any response from the market who were hoping for a cut on the price of the iPhone 4s.

Sony Executives claim :

While this loss of sales prompted Apple to relaunch iPhone 4 once again in India in January, sales have not picked up since it is not at all spending on marketing or offering any buyback offer and even the initial euphoria around iPhone 5S has sobered down,

Kenichiro Hibi, managing director at Sony India, said the company’s smartphone business has attained similar revenues as its flagship television business in the fiscal ended March 31.

[quote text_size=”small” author=”Kenichiro Hibi, ” author_title=”Managing Director at Sony India”]The smartphone business doubled in last one year which led to 20% growth in overall sales in 2013-14. We expect to grow at a similar pace this fiscal as well to touch Rs 12,000 crore sales[/quote]

While this may be considered a big loss for Apple, the company has seen decline of sale during the months that lead up to the launch of their next flagship.

April 4, 2014