COMMENT: Will Sony succeed in the long term or will they become another Kodak, Polaroid, Compaq or Nokia? For eight years the Company has wallowed in the fast growing TV market, they failed to deliver OLED, and most of their products are now made by third party companies.In Australia the arrogance of the Company, who moved to ban SmartHouse three years ago because we alerted consumers to price gouging by Sony and their poor performance, is still there.
This week’s House Standing Committee on Infrastructure and Communications, investigation of technology and consumer electronics pricing, heard that Sony is still trying to charge Australians a premium for music, gaming products as well as their struggling PCs and consumer electronic products.
Three years ago we said that Sony was set to fail: their latest losses and falling sales report vindicates the position we took over Sony.
Last night Sony confirmed that it plans to cut a further 10,000 jobs this fiscal year and have also slashed its sales targets for most of its consumer-electronics portfolio. It scaled back sales projections for LCD televisions, digital cameras, Blu-ray disc players, computers and hand-held game machines after reporting another $300M quarterly loss. This is the fourth straight year of losses for the Japanese Company.
In Australia Sony has been forced to shift slow selling stock by discounting. Margins that Sony had in their Bravia TVs due to a move to low cost manufacturers have been eroded because consumers were buying LG and Samsung TVs ahead of Sony products.
In the PC and smartphone market Sony is falling further behind because the consumer has already worked out that a Sony smartphone lacks the brand pedigree of an Apple or Samsung phone.
Their PCs are overpriced despite being designed and manufactured by a third party and the Sony brand that once stood for quality, innovation and generated a premium price is struggling to generate any street cred because the new generation of consumers are into Apple, Samsung and Google products.
Even sales of the Company’s digital camera range are flat.
Australian retailers have told SmartHouse that consumers don’t come in asking for a Sony product anymore, “We have to sell them a Sony product over a Samsung or Apple product because we now have better margins in a Sony product than before” a major retailer told SmartHouse this week.
The red ink is set to continue at Sony and the only way out for the Japanese brand is to create a product that is unique and one that consumers actually want and admire.
Current management appear not to have that skill despite billions being thrown at research and development.
