Sony Sells PC Business, Turns TV Business Into Subsidiary

[Friendly]

As part of a major reorganization, Sony announced today that the unprofitable PC business (Sony Vayo) will be sold off and its TV division will become a wholly owned subsidiary. 5,000 jobs will be cut.
Contrary to prior projections and while a profit was posted for Q3, Sony actually lost a total of $1.1 billion in 2013 due to large losses in the PC and TV sector. Wheras there was a small loss in the smart phone business (Xperia sales forecast was lowered from 42 million to 40 million), this sector is expected to become profitable in the near future. Sony's other (content related) segments were more successful (Sony Music, Sony Pictures, game business). After 2nd quarter losses in the movie studio business Sony managed to implement a cost saving measure saving $250 million, making Q3 profitable.
On the gaming side Sony was successful in 2013, projecting a total of 15 million sold consoles (PS3 and PS4 combined) for the fiscal year ending in March 2014, along with 5 million portable game systems (there is no differentiation between PSP and Vita; obviously to hide the relatively low Vita sales). Despite losses due to PS4 R&D and a PS Vita price reduction, overall Sony's game business was profitable in 2013, with a 64% sales boost.

http://www.theverge.com/2014/2/6/538465 ... 3-earnings
Consolidated 3rd quarter results: http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/IR/financi ... 3_sony.pdf

Interesting part for gamers:

Home consoles sold in 2013 (millions of units)
Sony: 14.3 (PS4: 4.2, PS3: 10.1)
Microsoft: 10.9 (XBone: 3, 360: 7.9)
Nintendo: 4.32 (Wii U: 2.8, Wii: 1.5)

[Skykid]

Bam, and there you go folks. Courtesy of your friendly shmups.org Sony disciple, Friendly.

Something had to give, as predicted by yours truly in three years of annual loss updates. Your applause won't be necessary.

[gct]

Damn, that's sad.

I have not owned a Sony computer for a while and with this news am unlikely to ever own one again, but in the previous decade I had some pretty exotic stuff from their U- and UX- lines. Those were too far ahead of their time, I wish those could be brought back with modern tech.

[Skykid]

Sony laptops have been substandard for years. After one Vaio I swore never to invest in such overpriced junk again - the work I lost on that machine was unforgivable.

Their tech isn't anywhere near what it was in the 80's and 90's - same goes for the TV's. After the Trinitron the best thing they turned out were rebadged Samsung panels.

Their cameras have improved with the Nex range though. If you bought a Cyber Shot in the mid-00's you have my commiserations.

[HydrogLox]

US/Canada Sony's Reader Store clientele is being transferred to Kobo - the US/Canada Reader Store closes March 20, 2014 at 6 p.m. (EST).

[RegalSin]

I don't know what your saying Skykid, the Trinitron was eventually free to license, after SONY stopped producing them. Meaning if you see a "Trinitron" mark on a TV set, and it is recent, most likely, it is a cop-off. Those things perform poor as a regular, television. It sloves many problems but they were made poor, to push us into the flatscreen market.

Also flatscreens, have the pugly wide screen AKA Kings View, and they have the tendency to die very quickly, if not I am still unable to view colors correctly, or images from the side. I have to be perfectly lined up, with the display, in order for it to look good.

Did you know, you could secure a TV set, of various big sizes to a wall??? I know it sounds and looks a bit unsafe but many stores, and public places do this on a continues basis, in the past. You can even make it pivit, or snap it to the side of a desk.

I still have CRT, and VGA displays, and they give me no problems. A Trinitron is what I use to game, when it comes to consoles, and no problem. I have seen bigger models, like in the 40" and no problems.

SONY was pushed out of the TV market by westerns. That is all. Their next invention ( the super flat displays, that can curve ), are not even known by most people.

...........................

About computers, what can I say, SONY is not a computer company, and while they have many workings and functions with computers, they never sold anything good outside of Japan. You should see some of the computer models from Japan, as well. Why can't they sell those?

SONY itself has it's claws inside of many media industry, like how Capcom owns the rights to Resident Evil, and Megaman. They are not doing one thing with the rights, asides collecting money from subscribers, and pay-downloaders.

Then their is the videogame market. SONY vs Lik-Sang. That is it, SONY just sucks period. I will admit, the PSX was great, but the PS2 is just an overhyped lame looking PSX. The PS3, while it did have the better outcome, many of the better known games are on the 360. The PS4 has a phucking TOS contract.

Did you know SONY is also selling internet media players, that does the same exact thing?
They are using the guts of their PS-2-3-4 etc, and leaving out the graphical nook.

SONY digital has to be great, between them and NEC, JVC, Hitachi, are the top running electronic wigs in Japan. Samsung however seems to be outdoing them, a bit

[BareKnuckleRoo]

SONY itself has it's claws inside of many media industry, like how Capcom owns the rights to Resident Evil, and Megaman. They are not doing one thing with the rights, asides collecting money from subscribers, and pay-downloaders.

Uh, you do realize that Capcom not only publishes, but also develops games for the RE and MM series, right? In a lot of cases it's as a joint dev team, but they actually do make those games, in fact the only Mega Man game I can think of off the top of my head where Capcom didn't act as a developer (even as a joint developer) are those shitty Mega Man games made for MS-DOS by Hi-Tech Expressions. "They are not doing one thing with the rights" is kinda far from the truth... in fact that's just flat-out incorrect.

[ColonelFatso]

Correct, they are doing something with the MM brand/IP...

...killing off all the interesting-looking projects while pushing out mobile games and VC rereleases instead.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

but the PS2 is just an overhyped lame looking PSX

Whoa, wait, what, how did I miss this gem? I literally can't come up with a good enough response to express my bafflement.

[drauch]

After you do some research on how to correctly use a comma, you may want to look into current television technology so you don't have such an insanely biased opinion that makes little to no sense.

Fun fact: not everyone plays older, sprite-based games, so your Trinitron and CRT argument, as usual, is invalid.

[Sly Cherry Chunks]

Hoping to buy a new PC this year. My VIAO has sucked shit since I bought it in 2010.

[Ed Oscuro]

I don't know what your saying Skykid, the Trinitron was eventually free to license, after SONY stopped producing them. Meaning if you see a "Trinitron" mark on a TV set, and it is recent, most likely, it is a cop-off.

Not quite.

The Trinitron, as technology, had its relevant patent(s?) expire. So in the last decade (or so) of CRT display production, there were many companies that were able to produce Trinitron tubes and flat displays without the license. There's nothing stopping these monitors from being decent, either; I have one by NEC which I am pretty sure didn't license any technology

The Trinitron, as a trademark, did not expire (despite what this confusingly says). So any other company than Sony using the Trinitron mark was most assuredly licensing Sony technology and probably sourcing tubes directly from Sony. This goes for displays like the Compaq P110 computer monitor, which was a rebadged Sony PC monitor.

These are entirely different things legally. I am sure that Sony put some patents on their FD Trinitron improvements that should still be in effect today.

[Specineff]

I don't know what your saying Skykid

You're. Contraction of "You are".

Did you know, you could secure a TV set, of various big sizes to a wall??? I know it sounds and looks a bit unsafe but many stores, and public places do this on a continues basis, in the past. You can even make it pivit, or snap it to the side of a desk.

I had heard of this nice fellow, Philo Farnsworth, who invented this thing called "Telly-vision". They say it lets one see and hear Bing Crosby inside of a box, even if he's at Carnegie Hall.

SONY itself has it's claws inside of many media industry.

Its. The neutral equivalent of his, hers, yours, and mine. Apostrophe means "It is".

Then their is the videogame market.

There. As in "here, and there". Please make sure to use the right word in this and the other cases I've pointed out. The wrong ones make you come off as incoherent.

The PS4 has a phucking TOS contract.

Microsoft isn't exactly the Salvation Army either.