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☆ Sony to lay off 900 at PlayStation as tough times for the games industry persist
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-27 | by ( Michael Nam | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

New York CNN —Electronics giant Sony announced on Tuesday that it will be cutting 900 jobs, or 8%, in PlayStation’s global workforce. The layoffs will impact all regions for Sony Interactive Entertainment, according to the PlayStation press release, with its in-house London studio, responsible for the competitive singing video game “Singstar,” closing entirely. “These are incredibly talented people who have been part of our success, and we are very grateful for their contributions,” wrote Jim Ryan, president and CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment. Ryan had already announced in September plans to retire in March as Sony Group Corporation president. Specifically, the video game industry has been seeing jobs hemorrhage from 2023 into this year as well, with Epic Games cutting 830 jobs last September and Tencent’s Riot Games laying off 11% of its workforce in January.

Persons: ”, Jim Ryan, Naomi Matsuouka, Ryan, Hiroki Totoki Organizations: New, New York CNN — Electronics, Sony, Sony Interactive Entertainment, PlayStation, London, Bloomberg, Sony Group Corporation, Epic Games, Riot Games, SONY Locations: New York

☆ Sony profit slides on chip slump, maintains PS5 sales target
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-09 | by ( Sam Nussey | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Profit for the quarter was 263 billion yen ($1.74 billion). That compared with a 306 billion yen estimate from 10 analysts polled by LSEG. The conglomerate sold 4.9 million PS5 units in the second quarter, bringing sales this financial year to 8.2 million units. Sony hiked its full-year sales forecast for the games unit by almost 5% to 190 billion yen. The company maintained its full-year operating profit at 1.17 trillion yen but raised its sales and net income forecast by 2% each.

Persons: Mike Blake, Hiroki Totoki, Jim Ryan, Jefferies, Atul Goyal, Sam Nussey, Muralikumar Anantharaman, Kim Coghill Organizations: Sony, REUTERS, LSEG, Industry, Bungie, Nintendo, Microsoft, Thomson Locations: Rancho Bernardo, California, TOKYO

☆ The boss of PlayStation is retiring after 28 years, saying he's tired of traveling so much for work
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-28 | by ( Sophia Ankel | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Playstation boss Jim Ryan is retiring after 28 years at the company, he said Wednesday. Ryan said he found it difficult to "reconcile living in Europe and working in North America." NEW LOOK Sign up to get the inside scoop on today’s biggest stories in markets, tech, and business — delivered daily. download the app Email address Sign up By clicking “Sign Up”, you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy . AdvertisementAdvertisementThe head of PlayStation and CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment said he's retiring to avoid the stress of constant travel for work.

Persons: Jim Ryan, Ryan, —, he's, Insider's Dave Smith, Hiroki Totoki Organizations: Service, PlayStation, Sony Interactive Entertainment, Sony Locations: Europe, North America, British, Japan

☆ Sony gaming chief Jim Ryan to retire, group president to be interim head
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-27 | by ( Sam Nussey | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Inside a GameStop store Sony PS5 gaming consoles are pictured in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York, U.S., November 12, 2020. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri/File Photo Acquire Licensing RightsCompanies Sony Group Corp FollowTOKYO, Sept 28 (Reuters) - Sony Group (6758.T) said on Thursday its gaming chief Jim Ryan would retire next March, with group President Hiroki Totoki to become interim CEO during the search for a successor. Ryan, who is British, become CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE) in 2019 and oversaw initiatives including the launch of the PlayStation 5 console the following year. "Jim no longer wants to manage the tradeoff between having a job in the U.S. and a home in the UK," SIE said in a statement. Reporting by Sam Nussey; Editing by Jamie Freed and Aurora EllisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Persons: Carlo Allegri, Jim Ryan, Hiroki Totoki, Ryan, Jim, SIE, Sam Nussey, Jamie Freed, Aurora Ellis Organizations: GameStop, Sony, REUTERS, Sony Group Corp, Sony Group, Sony Interactive Entertainment, PlayStation, Thomson Locations: Manhattan, New York City , New York, U.S

☆ Sony to boost gaming unit with $2.17 bln R&D war chest for 2024 - Nikkei
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-12 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

July 13 (Reuters) - Sony Group (6758.T) will infuse 300 billion yen ($2.17 billion) to expedite research and development efforts for its gaming segment for 2024, to catch up with its competitor Microsoft (MSFT.O), the Nikkei reported on Thursday. Sony will now aim to focus on live service games that let customers purchase add-ons for titles streamed online, moving away from its sole reliance on sales of its PlayStation game console, Nikkei said. The technology and entertainment conglomerate is expected to spend about 760 billion yen for company-wide R&D for fiscal 2024, the report said. Sony plans to have 12 live service game titles in its portfolio by fiscal 2026, up from just one in fiscal 2021, the Nikkei added. "We will continue to make strategic investments going forward, prioritizing intellectual property," Nikkei quoted Sony Group president Hiroki Totoki.

Persons: Hiroki Totoki, Roushni Nair, Shailesh Organizations: Sony Group, Microsoft, Nikkei, Sony, PlayStation, Gaming, Activision Blizzard, Thomson Locations: Bengaluru

☆ Sony eyes finance unit listing, doubles down on entertainment
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-18 | by ( Sam Nussey | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Sony said it is considering a time frame of two to three years to spin off Sony Financial Group - whose operations include life insurance and banking - with an eye to listing the business and retaining a stake of slightly under 20%. The conglomerate is pursuing synergies between its business lines, which include video games, music and movies. A partial spin-off of Sony Financial, which the group said was made possible by changes in tax rules, would allow the newly listed business to retain Sony branding. The finance business reported a 5% fall in revenue to 1.45 trillion yen ($10.74 billion) in the year ended March. Sony CEO Kenichiro Yoshida said he recently watched the movie in Tokyo and used to play "Super Mario" too.

☆ Sony shares tumble on weaker-than-expected annual outlook
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-01 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

TOKYO, May 1 (Reuters) - Sony Group Corp's (6758.T) shares fell as much as 4.8% on Monday after the Japanese electronics and entertainment conglomerate's annual profit outlook fell short of market expectations. The company on Friday posted a record operating profit for the year ended March 2023, driven by a robust performance at its music and microchip units. For the current business year, however, it projected a 3.2% profit decline to 1.17 trillion yen ($8.55 billion), missing an analysts average estimate of a 1.275 trillion yen profit, as it expects slow recovery in profitability in the videogame unit. Jefferies analyst Atul Goyal said in a note to clients Sony's outlook "is overly conservative," and that its PlayStation 5 (PS5) game consoles and game software are likely to benefit from pent-up demand. The conglomerate aims to sell a record 25 million units of the PS5 in the year to next March.

The Japanese company said it expects operating profit in the year to March 31 to fall 3.2% to 1.17 trillion yen ($8.65 billion), lower than an analysts' average estimate of a 1.275 trillion yen profit, according to Refinitiv data. For this business year, the company forecast profit at its gaming and network unit to rise by 8% to 270 billion yen. Software sales ought to have grown in tandem with hardware," Yasuda said. Sony also predicted that image sensor operating profit will dip by 5.8% to 200 billion yen. The firm said overall operating profit for the three months that ended March 31 fell 7.3% to 128.5 billion yen, with full year profit nudging up to a record 1.21 trillion yen.

☆ Sony Group CFO Totoki to succeed Yoshida as president
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-02 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Feb 2 (Reuters) - Sony Group Corp (6758.T) said on Thursday chief financial officer Hiroki Totoki would become president and chief operating officer on April 1 while retaining his current role. Incumbent president Kenichiro Yoshida will remain as chairman and chief executive officer. The entertainment and electronics conglomerate will hold a news conference on its new leadership at 4:00 p.m. (0700 GMT). Besides his role as chief financial officer in 2018, Totoki has been chief of the company's mobile phone division and head of the banking division. Reporting by Gokul Pisharody in Bengaluru and Kiyoshi Takenaka in Tokyo; Editing by Jacqueline Wong and Bradley PerrettOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Sony lifts outlook, but still falls short of expectations
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-02 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

[1/2] Logos of Sony Corp are seen at an electronics store in Narita International airport in Narita, Japan, November 1, 2016. The electronics and entertainment giant also said itschief financial officer, Hiroki Totoki, would become president and chief operating officer from April 1, while retaining his current role. The company said it now expects operating profit for the year to March 31 to total 1.18 trillion yen ($9.17 billion), up from its previous forecast of 1.16 trillion yen. That remains short of analysts' average estimate of a 1.19 trillion yen profit, according to Refinitiv data, and just shy of a record profit of 1.2 trillion yen posted a year earlier. ($1 = 128.6800 yen)Reporting by Kiyoshi Takenaka Editing by Shri Navaratnam and David DolanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Sony shares jump 9% after profit forecast hike
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-02 | by ( Sam Nussey | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

TOKYO, Nov 2 (Reuters) - Shares in Sony Group Corp (6758.T) leapt 9% on Wednesday morning after the entertainment conglomerate hiked its full-year profit forecast in contrast to lacklustre projections by many peers. Sony reported that it produced more than 6.5 million PlayStation 5 (PS5) units during the second quarter ahead of the year-end shopping season, signalling that supply chain snarls that have hampered the games business are easing. The value of inventory at Sony's games unit surged to 412.5 billion yen ($2.79 billion) in the second quarter, versus 146.2 billion yen three months earlier. Sony aims to sell more than 18 million PS5 units this year, Chief Financial Officer Hiroki Totoki has said. The Japanese conglomerate also hiked the outlook for its movies and image sensor businesses citing the FX boost but noted lower sensor sales.

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