别吵了，转一篇wsj关于索尼的评论员文章# PhotoGear - 摄影器材
d*n
1 楼
http://online.wsj.com/articles/sony-struggles-with-the-bottom-l
5月12日新鲜出炉
For Sony, Struggle is Still the Bottom Line
Company Set to Report Fourth Annual Loss in Five Years
Email
Print
0 Comments
Facebook
Twitter
Google+
LinkedIn
smaller
Larger
By ERIC PFANNER AND KANA INAGAKI
May 12, 2014 8:35 a.m. ET
Sony CEO Kazuo Hirai reacts during a news conference in Tokyo in February,
when Sony announced it was selling its Vaio personal computer operations and
cutting its global workforce. Associated Press
TOKYO—Two years after Kazuo Hirai took over as chief executive of Sony Corp
. 6758.TO -0.57% , it is slipping into a familiar pattern. After telling
investors that a turnaround was at hand, the company is set Wednesday to
report its fourth annual loss in five years.
Consumers have moved on to brands such as Apple AAPL +1.18% and Samsung.
005930.SE +3.97% Ratings agencies have downgraded Sony's debt to junk
status. And longtime Sony watchers fear Mr. Hirai is more focused on casting
off its failures than on finding the hit product that could restore its
reputation as one of the most innovative companies of the past century.
"Mr. Hirai delivers outward messages that are positive. But there is still
the image that products that don't make money are dumped, while there is no
longer-term vision for what kind of a new lifestyle Sony wants to create,"
said Shingo Tamura, a former engineer who left Sony in 2006.
Mr. Hirai, who is set to reveal Sony's long-term strategy May 22, has
promised to rebuild the company's troubled electronics arm around three
pillars: games, imaging technology and mobile devices.
"Sometimes at Sony, we zigzag our way to great innovations, and simply other
times, we fail," he said at a Las Vegas trade show in January. "But, you
know, at Sony, failure is not really an end. It's a reason. It's a reason to
keep trying."
The company declined to comment for this article ahead of the earnings and
strategy briefings.
Sony's new game system, the PlayStation 4, is performing well. Through early
April, Sony had sold more than seven million PS4 consoles in its first five
months on the market, beating Microsoft Corp.'s MSFT +1.01% new Xbox One
console.
Sony also sees promise in its high-definition portable music players, which
it is selling under the Walkman name, as well as 4K televisions that offer
improved picture quality. Other gadgets, such as motion sensors that can be
attached to tennis rackets, are aimed at rebuilding Sony's brand.
The problem is that so far, none of the growth areas seem capable of
transforming Sony's bottom line. The 4K TVs, for example, make up less than
10% of global TV sales, and it is hard for niche products to move the needle
at a company with around $75 billion in annual revenue.
Less than two weeks ago, Sony forecast a loss of 130 billion yen ($1.3
billion) for the fiscal year that ended in March—a sharp swing from the 30
billion yen profit that it had earlier predicted. Troubles in electronics
again outweighed profits from movies and music.
Even the PlayStation isn't the cash cow it once was, because consumers are
spending more time playing on smartphones. Sony's sales target of 20 million
units of PlayStation hardware for the just-ended fiscal year is 45% below
its level six years ago.
Sony said in February it would sell its personal computer business and set
up its TV business as a separate, though wholly owned, unit. The company is
booking much of the cost of that restructuring in the just-ended year,
leading some investors to say the worst may be over.
"I don't know when their next hit product will [come] or when their
restructuring is going to stop, but at least they're on the right track,"
said Arnout Van Rijn, chief investment officer at Robeco Hong Kong, whose
fund has been investing in Sony shares for nearly a decade. "So far it's
been taking disappointingly long, but eventually that value will be there."
A viable mobile business seems like a prerequisite for success in consumer
electronics, given that smartphones bundle together the roles once played by
Sony products such as the PlayStation, the Walkman and Cyber-shot cameras.
In 2012, the year Mr. Hirai became CEO, Sony made progress toward his goal
of establishing the company as a clear No. 3 in smartphones, behind Samsung
Electronics Co. and Apple Inc. Helped by strength in Japan and Europe, where
Sony still benefits from the legacy of a defunct partnership with Ericsson
of Sweden, Sony's share of the global market climbed to 4.3% in 2012,
according to IDC, a research firm.
Last year, Sony slipped back to 3.8% and stood in sixth place. While the
company's Xperia smartphones have received favorable reviews, consumers see
few compelling reasons to trade in their iPhones or Galaxy handsets.
Inexpensive Chinese handsets control the low end of the market, and in the U
.S., Sony lacks strong relationships with mobile carriers.
The company has said it won't pursue market volume and be dragged into price
competition on smartphones, although it has released less-expensive models
for emerging markets.
Sony has had more success with one of the key components of smartphones—the
built-in cameras. Sensors made by Sony are used in iPhones and a number of
other smartphones. That buttressed one of Mr. Hirai's three growth pillars,
the company's imaging business.
Yet even the sensor business faces challenges. Samsung, which previously
used Sony sensors in its flagship phones, turned to in-house imaging
technology for its current top-of-the-line handset, the Galaxy S5.
Many of the questions about Sony's future center on its identity as a
consumer-electronics company. Its profits today largely come from disparate
businesses such as Hollywood movies, recorded music and a bank and life
insurance unit in Japan. Adding to the impression of disjointedness, Sony
said in April that it would invest $2 million to start a real-estate
brokerage in Japan.
Other Japanese technology giants such as Panasonic Corp. 6752.TO -0.57% ,
Toshiba Corp. 6502.TO -1.25% and Hitachi Ltd. 6501.TO -0.68% had big parts
-making operations and industrial businesses to fall back on when their
consumer businesses ran into trouble. All three reported profits in the just
-ended fiscal year.
Panasonic generates about three-quarters of its revenue from sales to other
businesses—supplying batteries to the electric car maker Tesla Motors Inc.,
TSLA +1.79% for example. By contrast, only around 10% of Sony's revenue
comes from sales to other businesses, according to Atul Goyal, an analyst at
Jefferies.
Some analysts say Sony should follow in Panasonic's path and get out of
televisions and other commodity consumer goods dominated by China and South
Korea. Others say the secret is to marry Sony's hardware expertise with new
software and services, such as a cloud-based television service Sony plans
in the U.S. this year.
"Of course it's nice to have better and better audio and video, but unless
it's part of an ecosystem it has no purpose. It's destined to be
commoditized," said Koichiro Tsujino, a longtime Sony executive who left in
2006 for Google Inc. GOOGL +1.82% and now runs a Japanese Internet company,
Alex Corp.
5月12日新鲜出炉
For Sony, Struggle is Still the Bottom Line
Company Set to Report Fourth Annual Loss in Five Years
0 Comments
Google+
smaller
Larger
By ERIC PFANNER AND KANA INAGAKI
May 12, 2014 8:35 a.m. ET
Sony CEO Kazuo Hirai reacts during a news conference in Tokyo in February,
when Sony announced it was selling its Vaio personal computer operations and
cutting its global workforce. Associated Press
TOKYO—Two years after Kazuo Hirai took over as chief executive of Sony Corp
. 6758.TO -0.57% , it is slipping into a familiar pattern. After telling
investors that a turnaround was at hand, the company is set Wednesday to
report its fourth annual loss in five years.
Consumers have moved on to brands such as Apple AAPL +1.18% and Samsung.
005930.SE +3.97% Ratings agencies have downgraded Sony's debt to junk
status. And longtime Sony watchers fear Mr. Hirai is more focused on casting
off its failures than on finding the hit product that could restore its
reputation as one of the most innovative companies of the past century.
"Mr. Hirai delivers outward messages that are positive. But there is still
the image that products that don't make money are dumped, while there is no
longer-term vision for what kind of a new lifestyle Sony wants to create,"
said Shingo Tamura, a former engineer who left Sony in 2006.
Mr. Hirai, who is set to reveal Sony's long-term strategy May 22, has
promised to rebuild the company's troubled electronics arm around three
pillars: games, imaging technology and mobile devices.
"Sometimes at Sony, we zigzag our way to great innovations, and simply other
times, we fail," he said at a Las Vegas trade show in January. "But, you
know, at Sony, failure is not really an end. It's a reason. It's a reason to
keep trying."
The company declined to comment for this article ahead of the earnings and
strategy briefings.
Sony's new game system, the PlayStation 4, is performing well. Through early
April, Sony had sold more than seven million PS4 consoles in its first five
months on the market, beating Microsoft Corp.'s MSFT +1.01% new Xbox One
console.
Sony also sees promise in its high-definition portable music players, which
it is selling under the Walkman name, as well as 4K televisions that offer
improved picture quality. Other gadgets, such as motion sensors that can be
attached to tennis rackets, are aimed at rebuilding Sony's brand.
The problem is that so far, none of the growth areas seem capable of
transforming Sony's bottom line. The 4K TVs, for example, make up less than
10% of global TV sales, and it is hard for niche products to move the needle
at a company with around $75 billion in annual revenue.
Less than two weeks ago, Sony forecast a loss of 130 billion yen ($1.3
billion) for the fiscal year that ended in March—a sharp swing from the 30
billion yen profit that it had earlier predicted. Troubles in electronics
again outweighed profits from movies and music.
Even the PlayStation isn't the cash cow it once was, because consumers are
spending more time playing on smartphones. Sony's sales target of 20 million
units of PlayStation hardware for the just-ended fiscal year is 45% below
its level six years ago.
Sony said in February it would sell its personal computer business and set
up its TV business as a separate, though wholly owned, unit. The company is
booking much of the cost of that restructuring in the just-ended year,
leading some investors to say the worst may be over.
"I don't know when their next hit product will [come] or when their
restructuring is going to stop, but at least they're on the right track,"
said Arnout Van Rijn, chief investment officer at Robeco Hong Kong, whose
fund has been investing in Sony shares for nearly a decade. "So far it's
been taking disappointingly long, but eventually that value will be there."
A viable mobile business seems like a prerequisite for success in consumer
electronics, given that smartphones bundle together the roles once played by
Sony products such as the PlayStation, the Walkman and Cyber-shot cameras.
In 2012, the year Mr. Hirai became CEO, Sony made progress toward his goal
of establishing the company as a clear No. 3 in smartphones, behind Samsung
Electronics Co. and Apple Inc. Helped by strength in Japan and Europe, where
Sony still benefits from the legacy of a defunct partnership with Ericsson
of Sweden, Sony's share of the global market climbed to 4.3% in 2012,
according to IDC, a research firm.
Last year, Sony slipped back to 3.8% and stood in sixth place. While the
company's Xperia smartphones have received favorable reviews, consumers see
few compelling reasons to trade in their iPhones or Galaxy handsets.
Inexpensive Chinese handsets control the low end of the market, and in the U
.S., Sony lacks strong relationships with mobile carriers.
The company has said it won't pursue market volume and be dragged into price
competition on smartphones, although it has released less-expensive models
for emerging markets.
Sony has had more success with one of the key components of smartphones—the
built-in cameras. Sensors made by Sony are used in iPhones and a number of
other smartphones. That buttressed one of Mr. Hirai's three growth pillars,
the company's imaging business.
Yet even the sensor business faces challenges. Samsung, which previously
used Sony sensors in its flagship phones, turned to in-house imaging
technology for its current top-of-the-line handset, the Galaxy S5.
Many of the questions about Sony's future center on its identity as a
consumer-electronics company. Its profits today largely come from disparate
businesses such as Hollywood movies, recorded music and a bank and life
insurance unit in Japan. Adding to the impression of disjointedness, Sony
said in April that it would invest $2 million to start a real-estate
brokerage in Japan.
Other Japanese technology giants such as Panasonic Corp. 6752.TO -0.57% ,
Toshiba Corp. 6502.TO -1.25% and Hitachi Ltd. 6501.TO -0.68% had big parts
-making operations and industrial businesses to fall back on when their
consumer businesses ran into trouble. All three reported profits in the just
-ended fiscal year.
Panasonic generates about three-quarters of its revenue from sales to other
businesses—supplying batteries to the electric car maker Tesla Motors Inc.,
TSLA +1.79% for example. By contrast, only around 10% of Sony's revenue
comes from sales to other businesses, according to Atul Goyal, an analyst at
Jefferies.
Some analysts say Sony should follow in Panasonic's path and get out of
televisions and other commodity consumer goods dominated by China and South
Korea. Others say the secret is to marry Sony's hardware expertise with new
software and services, such as a cloud-based television service Sony plans
in the U.S. this year.
"Of course it's nice to have better and better audio and video, but unless
it's part of an ecosystem it has no purpose. It's destined to be
commoditized," said Koichiro Tsujino, a longtime Sony executive who left in
2006 for Google Inc. GOOGL +1.82% and now runs a Japanese Internet company,
Alex Corp.
