Sony smartphone shipments plummet, PlayStation division turns profit

Sony has shipped just 2 million Xperia smartphones in recent months. That is 70 percent less than in the same quarter a year earlier. Other Sony divisions outperformed, increasing the group’s sales and profits.

Sony reports the number of Xperia smartphones delivered in its quarterly figures. In the same period a year earlier, the Japanese manufacturer delivered 3.4 million copies. The drop in numbers is deliberate; Sony wants to make fewer models to make the smartphone division more profitable, but the division’s sales also fell in the past quarter, to 132.5 billion yen. That is almost 27 percent less than last year. The department did not make a profit and ended up with a loss of 10.8 billion yen, approximately 82.5 million euros.

Other Sony divisions are doing better. For example, turnover in the games division rose by almost 36 percent to 472.1 billion yen and profits at 83.5 billion yen were 472 percent higher than in the same quarter last year. 3.2 million units of the PlayStation 4 were shipped, bringing the total to 82.2 million consoles shipped. It is a small decrease compared to the 3.3 million copies in the same quarter last year, but that decrease was already predicted by Sony when the previous quarterly figures were presented. Even then, console deliveries decreased compared to a year earlier. The good figures of the games division are due to good sales of games.

Shipments of TVs increased from 2.5 million units a year ago to 2.6 million units in the quarter. The number of cameras delivered remained the same at 1 million units, but due to a shift to more expensive models, sales and profits were higher.

All Sony business units achieved quarterly sales of 1.95 trillion yen, an increase of 5 percent. Profit came in at 195 billion yen, an increase of 26 percent. Sony points in particular to the good figures of the gaming division as an explanation for the good results.