Sony reported mixed earnings for its last quarter, with overall the corporation showing a healthy increase in income (up over 100 percent) on revenue that’s up by 6 percent. These numbers are estimates, though, as Sony notified investors it’s not ready to declare final numbers for the Sony Pictures division, which suffered a massive hacking attack late last year. Still, the rest of the company did well overall, with areas like Home Entertainment & Sound and Imaging Products & Solutions showing decreases. However, its film division managed to actually eke out a small profit, despite a controversial hack and the lack of a nationwide release for the comedy The Interview. Sony’s video game business was the bright spot, as the PlayStation 4 continued to thrive.
Games and Network Services reported sales of $4.4 billion (¥531.5 billion yen) for the three months at the end of last year, noted GamesIndustry International. That’s a 16.8 percent increase over the previous year, a nice boost considering that the PS4 was popular enough already with its launch in November 2013. In addition, Sony reported that 6.4 million PS4’s were shipped for the quarter, up from 4.5 million the previous year.
That’s not to say all Sony game consoles did well, though. PlayStation TV, the broadcast equivalent of the company’s PS Vita handheld, was weak enough that it resulted in a $93 million (¥11.2 billion) write down, with a drop in shipments for the PS Vita itself, down to 1.4 million (from the previous year’s two million).
Software, though, was on the rise, with a total of ¥147 billion following last year’s 128 billion yen. Network services also saw a “boost,” even with service interruptions, doubling from ¥50 billion to ¥100 billion. PlayStation Plus is said to be a huge driving force in this area.
Games and Network Services overall saw a 122 percent increase year-over-year to $228 million (¥27.6 billion). This led to an overall business total of $21 billion (¥2,557.8 billion) and a net income of $736 million (¥89 billion).
As for the film division, Sony Pictures Entertainment showed a profit of $20 million (¥24.3 billion) for the fiscal third quarter, even with its problems, although Sony Pictures in itself saw a 90 percent fall in operating income over the previous year. The biggest box office hit for the company at the time was Brad Pitt’s Fury, while holiday release Annie came up as a slight disappointment.
Overall, the quarter “is expected to include approximately $15 million (¥1.8 billion) in investigation and remediation costs,” according to the company, in terms of what the cyber-attack has done.
So what does this all mean Sony still has issues to work out, like boosting its mobile business and trying to restore television sales and profits to their long-ago glory, but the company is back on an even keel after several years of rocky results. The interesting story here is the emergence of the PlayStation 4 as a key element in the company’s strategy, a leader in the console business that can help drive other areas of the company. This is not to say the rest of the PlayStation products can coast to victory; the PS Vita, the PS TV, and the PlayStation 3 are all struggling to find relevance in the future of the PlayStation brand.
Sony will no doubt press forward with more exclusive content for the PlayStation 4, and while Microsoft is making good headway with the Xbox One, the PS4 won’t be giving up the number one position in the console business any time soon (if ever!). What will be interesting to watch is how Sony can take advantage of this leadership to boost other products and services, and what new ones may be introduced over the next year or so with the PlayStation 4 as a key element.
