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[dragonbane]

Come on Sony, you can do this!

 

[zomgbbqftw]

This makes no sense. Leaving such a huge market to Samsung and HTC is idiotic.

Agreed. I think Kaz needs to seriously take a look at fixing the US market.

I really don't understand what this guy is saying right now. Seriously that was not clear at all. Everyone here is looking quizzically at each other...

basically he said they will not make major push and resource investment, but doesn't mean that they wont do anything at all.

No, there was a follow up which asked whether Sony would make a serious entry into the US market with Xperia in the current fiscal year and he said no/unlikely.

 

[Canis lupus]

Ah its over.

 

[Shayan]

Agreed. I think Kaz needs to seriously take a look at fixing the US market.

I really don't understand what this guy is saying right now. Seriously that was not clear at all. Everyone here is looking quizzically at each other...

Maybe they are waiting for Sammy to give Apple the killer blow

Then they have something planned to take on Sammy?

 

[dancmc]

So with no forecasts for PS4 shipments; it seems probably that exact launch timing in each region have not been finalized. Does that sound right? and if so; is that normal for 5-6 months prior to launch or are they more likely just not forecasting due to competitive reasons.

 

[Moonstone]

5M Vita/PSP forecast is basically the first real admission from Sony of what's been obvious to most of us for some time: that Vita's current sales situation isn't salvageable. I expect them to act accordingly.

Don't expect much time to be spent on Vita at the E3 press conference; don't expect a wave of major software announcements at E3, Gamescom, or TGS; don't expect that big a marketing push for Killzone or Tearaway; and don't expect SCE to put any real effort into pushing Vita as a PS4 accessory.

I don't even think an NA/EU price cut is a sure thing anymore, though it's still more likely than not.

Also, looks like Sony has scheduled their corporate strategy meeting for the 22nd. Possibly more details about their plans for specific game platforms there.

They know that there is no market for dedicated gaming handhelds in the west. So they'll keep on doing what they did. Keep Vita in a coma in the west, try something in Japan where it's doing ok.

After the PS4 is launched there will be some talk about the remote feature and they can do relative cheap cross buy promos and PSN+ deals (and other services) for the enthusiasts.
There is also Gaikai coming.

I think they cut the price with the start of FY14 and try to reposition the vita as ps4 remote device and offer more services. A price cut right now wouldn't change anything neither would another Uncharted or GoW. Vita needs to get some mindshare first. PS4 is it's only saviour.

 

[spwolf]

Agreed. I think Kaz needs to seriously take a look at fixing the US market.

I really don't understand what this guy is saying right now. Seriously that was not clear at all. Everyone here is looking quizzically at each other...



No, there was a follow up which asked whether Sony would make a serious entry into the US market with Xperia in the current fiscal year and he said no/unlikely.

i dont think that was understood correctly, because previous question he said "that doesnt mean that we wont do anything" or something similar to that. There was a lot of bad English at the end.

 

[zomgbbqftw]

i dont think that was understood correctly, because previous question he said "that doesnt mean that we wont do anything" or something similar to that. There was a lot of bad English at the end.

Tbh, it matches up with what I have heard from development sources at Sony. T-Mobile only. No presence on AT&T, VZW or Sprint until next year.

 

[Father_Brain]

They know that there is no market for dedicated gaming handhelds in the west. So they'll keep on doing what they did. Keep Vita in a coma in the west, try something in Japan where it's doing ok.

While Vita has certainly outperformed my post-price-cut expectations in Japan, it's not "doing OK." Even assuming that the 15-17K it was selling for most of April is its new baseline, that's worse than 3DS was selling before its own price cut, and there's no software announced that could produce more than brief bumps.

Also, even keeping it in a coma in the West will prove difficult, as two new consoles plus Disney Infinity mean that retailers will have no choice but to cut shelf space for existing platforms.

After the PS4 is launched there will be some talk about the remote feature and they can do relative cheap cross buy promos and PSN+ deals (and other services) for the enthusiasts.
There is also Gaikai coming.

I think they cut the price with the start of FY14 and try to reposition the vita as ps4 remote device and offer more services. A price cut right now wouldn't change anything neither would another Uncharted or GoW. Vita needs to get some mindshare first. PS4 is it's only saviour.

It's not going to be saved by positioning it as a $200 (or even $150) accessory for a $400 console. Period. Remote play is a nifty value add feature, and that's it.

 

[Officerrob]

They know that there is no market for dedicated gaming handhelds in the west. So they'll keep on doing what they did. Keep Vita in a coma in the west, try something in Japan where it's doing ok.

After the PS4 is launched there will be some talk about the remote feature and they can do relative cheap cross buy promos and PSN+ deals (and other services) for the enthusiasts.
There is also Gaikai coming.

I think they cut the price with the start of FY14 and try to reposition the vita as ps4 remote device and offer more services. A price cut right now wouldn't change anything neither would another Uncharted or GoW. Vita needs to get some mindshare first. PS4 is it's only saviour.

Than it has no savior. A $400-$500 console isn't going to push a +$200 handheld with very little support to anyone but the hardest of the hardcore. Pushing it as a remote device simply won't cut it

 

[Lagspike_exe]

Tbh, it matches up with what I have heard from development sources at Sony. T-Mobile only. No presence on AT&T, VZW or Sprint until next year.

Why are they doing this? What's so hard about releasing phones at different carriers?

Regarding the Vita situation, the only way out is investment into software development, which they must make if they want to create any sort of a viable platform.

 

[Road]

Let's assume Nintendo was 100% incorrect and Vita sold 0 units so far in Europe:

US: 1.28 in 2012 according to NPD +~100k this year so far = 1.38 million
Japan: 1.5 million

Total of two countries: 2.88 million. That's without Canada, whole of Europe, Australia, Asia, South America, Central America, Middle East and so on.

Still unsure about this? It definetly has sold more than 3.6 million, so it definetly shipped a lot more than that.

So, we have estimated sell-through as 2.9 million across US and Japan. That would leave less than 0.7 million for Europe, Canada and Australia (emerging markets are irrelevant for Vita sales at this point), which I agree is low.

But this what Sony said: that vita hardware unit sales decreased this fiscal year and that in the last fiscal year they sold 1.8 million units. *shrugs*

(Maybe they meant 1.8m sold to consumers last fiscal year?? Have to check that.)

 

[Moonstone]

While Vita has certainly outperformed my post-price-cut expectations in Japan, it's not "doing OK."

Relatively speaking. I won't argue about semantics if ok means bad or poor.

After all it's the only market where a gaming handheld could have a potential to sell.

This is why they did a price cut there and probably won't do a price cut in the west before manufacturing costs are down.

 

[Jigolo]

I wouldn't call ports of indie titles "support".
Really, Sony has sold Vita as a powerfull handheld, if they want to support it, they would release AAA titles.

Killzone:M and Tearaway say hi. Not much else though, unfortunately

Any profit for Sony right now is a good thing. All things considered I think the company is going to have a huge turn around. Still a fairly new CEO in Kaz (Howard Stringer was terrible) he's only been that position for about a year, they only recently have gotten serious in the cell phone biz with the Z and ZL, PS4 from what we know so far is looking like it is going to have a very bright future, launching 4K TVs at $5000 (I personally thought they were gonna be $15,000)

 

[Father_Brain]

Relatively speaking. I won't argue about semantics if ok means bad or poor.

After all it's the only market where a gaming handheld could have a potential to sell.

This is why they did a price cut there and probably won't do a price cut in the west before manufacturing costs are down.

That's fair. I assure you I have no interest in getting into semantic arguments, either.

 

[jcm]

While Vita has certainly outperformed my post-price-cut expectations in Japan, it's not "doing OK." Even assuming that the 15-17K it was selling for most of April is its new baseline, that's worse than 3DS was selling before its own price cut, and there's no software announced that could produce more than brief bumps.

Also, even keeping it in a coma in the West will prove difficult, as two new consoles plus Disney Infinity mean that retailers will have no choice but to cut shelf space for existing platforms.

It's doing well enough to survive in Japan. Whether it makes sense for Sony to continue a product line whose best performance is "well enough to survive in Japan" is another question.

The 3DS means a lot more to Nintendo than the Vita does to Sony. Comparing them in a corp strategy sense doesn't tell you much.

 

[Father_Brain]

It's doing well enough to survive in Japan. Whether it makes sense for Sony to continue a product line whose best performance is "well enough to survive in Japan" is another question.

If it can actually maintain 15-17K as a baseline, perhaps, but that's not a given in light of the software lineup.

The 3DS means a lot more to Nintendo than the Vita does to Sony. Comparing them in a corp strategy sense doesn't tell you much.

True enough. For that reason, I suspect that when all is said and done, Wii U will be a bigger failure than Vita by most metrics other than lifetime unit sales.

 

[AranhaHunter]

but in a few years when PC meets its demise, MS would have to care about other pets . Windows dies with PC and in smartphone and tablet arena , unless MS has the lamp of Aladdin , there is no light at the end of those tunnels

The majority ( I would guess 90%+) of Fortune 500 companies (and most other companies outside of it) pay MS a license fee for Windows, Office, and other MS products. Those companies have billions of dollars invested into the MS ecosystem.

However, with more and more dev, finance, functional, etc tools being platform independent and going to the cloud, that can change, but I honestly don't see it happening anytime soon.

 

[Loris146]

I'm listening the conference call. Very interisting. Now he is explaining why the launch of PS4 will be different then PS3.

 

[Shayan]

The majority ( I would guess 90%+) of Fortune 500 companies (and most other companies outside of it) pay MS a license fee for Windows, Office, and other MS products. Those companies have billions of dollars invested into the MS ecosystem.

However, with more and more dev, finance, functional, etc tools being platform independent and going to the cloud, that can change, but I honestly don't see it happening anytime soon.

in which world are you living? PC sales fell 14% last quarter. This quarter, it will be even worse. PCs/handhelds are being replaced by smartphones and tablets. That is a phenomenon which cant be stopped.

Many companies invested billions in Nortel and Worldtel too. Nokia chose Windows 8 and are on the brink of imminent death. Lumia increased Windows share by a whisker in the mobile domain, only to see its mother brand die

Cloud computing just like those apple /samsung phones will gain steam all of a sudden. We are talking about paradigm shift here. Old /unrefined tech being replaced by superior ones

On topic, some people are still thinking that SONY shipped a large amount of ps2s last quarter when they stopped its production in Dec 2012

 

[electroplankton]

Relatively speaking. I won't argue about semantics if ok means bad or poor.

After all it's the only market where a gaming handheld could have a potential to sell.

This is why they did a price cut there and probably won't do a price cut in the west before manufacturing costs are down.

It's really because Japan should be the handheld gaming paradise that Vita is not doing ok there. Relatively speaking, indeed.

 

[XiaNaphryz]

in which world are you living? PC sales fell 14% last quarter. This quarter it will be even worse. PCs/handhelds are being replaced by smartphones and tablets. That is a phenomenon which cant be stopped.

I thought those figures are consumer sales, not corporate/enterprise since those are often done on a separate contractual basis per company in terms of workstations?

 

[Toxa]

Monika Lee cosplaying Yuna

lovely thanks

 

[AranhaHunter]

Reiterates wait and see approach for US smartphone market. No entrance into the US market this fiscal year. Wow. So much for the H2 flagship being available on all carriers in the US.

Amazing. :/

yeah, the vita is dead. the ps4 has more hype than the vita ever had, and from the looks of it, 1st and 3rd party support too. and if you look at the ps3, it has a lot more planned out for this year than the vita.
to me, they should have never released the vita and focused all their efforts on home consoles.

Just look at the list of games announced for PS4 already, COD: Ghosts, Battlefield 4, Killzone, Witcher 3, Cyberpunk, Diablo 3, ACIV, Watch Dogs, DriveClub, etc

The vita, today, does not have a lineup that comes even close to that.

 

[EagleEyes]

in which world are you living? PC sales fell 14% last quarter. This quarter, it will be even worse. PCs/handhelds are being replaced by smartphones and tablets. That is a phenomenon which cant be stopped.

Many companies invested billions in Nortel and Worldtel too. Nokia chose Windows 8 and are on the brink of imminent death. Lumia increased Windows share by a whisker in the mobile domain, only to see its mother brand die

Cloud computing just like those apple /samsung phones will gain steam all of a sudden. We are talking about paradigm shift here. Old /unrefined tech being replaced by superior ones

On topic, some people are still thinking that SONY shipped a large amount of ps2s last quarter when they stopped its production in Dec 2012

Do you have definitive proof that Sony somehow had their best Jan.-Mar. ever for the PS3? Their games division for software and hardware were down 12% from the previous year and Ps3/PS2 sales slid from 18 million to 16.5 million. Unless you have proof you are just speculating like the rest of the people in this thread.

 

[Phoenician_Viking]

Does SOE fall under SCEI?

 

[kswiston]

I wish that Sony would just officially announce that the PS3 is past the 360 worldwide so that we can stop debating it in every thread. It's going to happen at some point. Even when it does, both systems are still going to be at virtually the same level when they stop selling, similar to the Gamecube and Xbox last gen. The boat has probably sailed on either passing the Wii, but ending within 10-15M of the Wii's LTD is still pretty impressive given where things were sitting in 2008-2009.

 

[pharmboy044]

CAPEX reduced on manufacturing and assembly. Good.

R&D streamlined to better areas. Less wasteful than in the past, concentrate resources to a few key areas, three pillars mentioned.

Increase R&D for gaming is specifically for development of software for PS4.

So what about the cost of ramping up PS4 hardware production? Will that be included in the next quarterly report or the one after that? Or have they already reported?

Also any PSN info? (revenue, PS+ users, digital sales)

 

[DieH@rd]

$400M profit?

That's less profit than in 2010 when they first stopped losing money on PS3.

Not good.

Gaming division of both MS and Sony is only one part of a very large corporation. Sony lost a fuckton of money in other parts of the company, and now Kaz has brought some order into chaos. Hopefully his restructuring [and new large investments] will start generating more money soon.

 

[AranhaHunter]

in which world are you living? PC sales fell 14% last quarter. This quarter, it will be even worse. PCs/handhelds are being replaced by smartphones and tablets. That is a phenomenon which cant be stopped.

Many companies invested billions in Nortel and Worldtel too. Nokia chose Windows 8 and are on the brink of imminent death. Lumia increased Windows share by a whisker in the mobile domain, only to see its mother brand die

Cloud computing just like those apple /samsung phones will gain steam all of a sudden. We are talking about paradigm shift here. Old /unrefined tech being replaced by superior ones

On topic, some people are still thinking that SONY shipped a large amount of ps2s last quarter when they stopped its production in Dec 2012

I am not disagreeing with you, I'm saying the majority of companies in this list pay MS a license fee to use Windows and Office for their corporate systems. There are also huge companies outside of that list, such as Deloitte and Accenture, that also use Windows.

As long as those companies stay with Windows and Windows based applications, MS will be just fine.

 

[driver116]

The HTC One and the Samsung Galaxy S4 came out in April, they will murder the Z.
Half a year ago they were the 3rd smathphone maker, now they are not in the Top 5.

http://gadgets.ndtv.com/mobiles/news/sony-xperia-z-sales-top-46-million-in-40-days-report-354794

Did you even read this?

 

[SniperHunter]

Does SOE fall under SCEI?

no, SOE does their own thing.

 

[Karma]

What happened to the smartphone numbers? I thought they were going to be 10 Million this quarter.

 

[DaBoss]

Man they're still combining the hardware shipments (projections)... That is shady as hell to investors.

So I take it they will take a minor loss in the PS4? Is a minor profit out of the question with a $499 price point?

 

[jcm]

If it can actually maintain 15-17K as a baseline, perhaps, but that's not a given in light of the software lineup.

Yes, agreed. If it falls back into the sub-10 range it's really fucked.

 

[DieH@rd]

Man they're still combining the hardware shipments (projections)... That is shady as hell to investors.

This will be the last year they will do this for PS3.

 

[Elios83]

Overall good news, they're back to profit after 4 years and the company has been deeply restructured in the process so there's a base for future profitability.
Hirai is turning things around, now they need to create more hit products like the Xperia Z and increase market share for their products especially in nord america.
Home consoles had a really positive shipments number for the quarter.
At this point PS3 LTD shipments should be really close or even slightly ahead of Xbox 360. Worst case PS3 will be second place by the end of April-June quarter.
Now the sad part is the Vita/PSP 2013 forecast.....5m is pure shit...I don't know if they want to be conservative because of the debacle they had this year (going down from 14m to 7m...) but the point is they they don't plan to do anything drastic or they don't believe that it will be sufficient to improve sales significantly anyway. Probably we'll get a 50$/€ discount in time for the holiday season and that's it. At least if they acknowledge that the Vita is a zombie platform all their resources and focus will be behind the PS4.

 

[Oersted]

Can't wait for those combined PS2/PS3/PS4 hardware sales numbers this time next year.

My thoughts aswell. Well, maybe they show some detailed numbers when Vita is completely abandoned.

 

[electroplankton]

Yes, agreed. If it falls back into the sub-10 range it's really fucked.

I think 15k baseline is not an different from a 10k baseline.

 

[QaaQer]

Companies that are healthy dont try to obfuscate their numbers. They don't suddenly start combining product lines for reporting purposes, they don't stick a bunch of asset sales into operating profits, etc. "fool people" is as good a term as any.

Financial results are manipulated only by criminals. Afaik, Sony isn't run by criminals; everything that has to be in a financial report is there.

As far as 'obfuscating', wtf?

Who are these reports for? These reports are made for the owners of the company, and Sony has always done a good job at keeping them informed.

People here want breakdowns why? So they can argue about whether Vita is dead? Whether PS3 is number 2? How does that help Sony or their investors? It doesn't. All that would come of it would be a bunch more 'vita is dead lol' posts.

 

[jcm]

Overall good news, they're back to profit after 4 years and the company has been deeply restructured in the process so there's a base for future profitability.
Hirai is turning things around, now they need to create more hit products like the Xperia Z and increase market share for their products especially in nord america.

I think this is premature, until we see them make money in their actual line of business, rather than through asset sales.

Financial results are manipulated only by criminals. Afaik, Sony isn't run by criminals; everything that has to be in a financial report is there.

As far as 'obfuscating', wtf?

Who are these reports for? These reports are made for the owners of the company, and Sony has always done a good job at keeping them informed.

People here want breakdowns why? So they can argue about whether Vita is dead? Whether PS3 is number 2? How does that help Sony or their investors? It doesn't. All that would come of it would be a bunch more 'vita is dead lol' posts.

Financial reports are manipulated by everyone. Companies choose which information to share, and which not to. That is manipulation. And the reason I want breakdowns is to evaluate the strength of the company. Which is the reason public companies do earnings reports, period.

Obfuscation (or beclouding) is the hiding of intended meaning in communication, making communication confusing, wilfully ambiguous, and harder to interpret. Why do you think Sony combined the handheld and console figures. Was it to clarify?

 

[max-pain]

http://gadgets.ndtv.com/mobiles/news/sony-xperia-z-sales-top-46-million-in-40-days-report-354794

Did you even read this?

Source, analysts. They know jack shit. There is no official number from Sony.

 

[QaaQer]

I think this is premature, until we see them make money in their actual line of business, rather than through asset sales.



Financial reports are manipulated by everyone. Companies choose which information to share, and which not to. That is manipulation. And the reason I want breakdowns is to evaluate the strength of the company. Which is the reason public companies do earnings reports, period.

Obfuscation (or beclouding) is the hiding of intended meaning in communication, making communication confusing, wilfully ambiguous, and harder to interpret. Why do you think Sony combined the handheld and console figures. Was it to clarify?

and if you were an actual investor with a decent stake in the company you could get that information.

And 'manipulation' has a more sinister connetation in the financial world, more akin to 'irregularities'.

edit: and seriously, breaking up psp and vita numbers would help you evaluate the whole of Sony? too funny.

 

[Elios83]

Btw Kaz Hirai will host a corporate strategy meeting on May 22

http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/IR/info/calendar/index.html

 

[jcm]

and if you were an actual investor with a decent stake in the company you could get that information.

That would be illegal.

And 'manipulation' has a more sinister connetation in the financial world, more akin to 'irregularities'.

Then I guess you shouldn't have used it. I didn't.

 

[QaaQer]

That would be illegal.


Then I guess you shouldn't have used it. I didn't.

Financial reports are manipulated by everyone.

.

 

[QaaQer]

That would be illegal.

Do you live in Japan?

 

[jcm]

.

Are you incapable of following your own conversation?

Me: Companies that are healthy dont try to obfuscate their numbers. They don't suddenly start combining product lines for reporting purposes, they don't stick a bunch of asset sales into operating profits, etc. "fool people" is as good a term as any.

You: Financial results are manipulated only by criminals.

Me: Financial reports are manipulated by everyone.

You: And 'manipulation' has a more sinister connetation in the financial world, more akin to 'irregularities'.

You brought up the word "manipulation". If you think it's such a bad word then you shouldn't have brought it up.

Do you live in Japan?

No, I live in the US. What does that have to do with anything at all?

 

[statham]

Btw Kaz Hirai will host a corporate strategy meeting on May 22

http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/IR/info/calendar/index.html

nice.

 

[Kimawolf]

Yeah I would wait to see more numbers before proclaiming anything, they sold off quite a few buildings and other assets to help make this profit.