Sony’s Finances Looking Good

Sony’s consolidated results for the 3 months to September 30th build on those from last quarter to paint an increasingly positive picture of the company’s financial health.  Sony as a whole recorded an operating income of Â¥68.7 billion (£524m, $828m) compared to the operating loss of Â¥32.6bn (£249m, $393m)they suffered in the same period last year.

Making a significant contribution to the turn around from a year ago and getting special mention on the front page of the report for their efforts is Sony’s Network Products and Services (NPS) segment, home of PlayStation.  This was despite the strong Yen (or weak Dollar and Euro) leading to unfavourable exchange rates.

Twelve months ago the NPS segment recorded an operating loss of ¥59bn (£450m, $710m) but in the last three months have returned an operating income of ¥6.9bn (£53m, $83m).  Sony cite the increased sales combined with the reduced cost to them of manufacturing the PS3 as a key factor, along with increasing PC unit sales.

Speaking of unit sales, in the quarter Sony sold 3.5m PS3s, up from 2.4m in Q1 and 3.2m in Q2 ’09 which saw the launch of the PS3 Slim.  The PSP recorded sales of 1.5m which is up from 1.2m in Q1, but down a massive 50% from 3m in Q2 ’09.  The venerable PS2 chalked up 1.5m sales, down slightly from 1.6m in Q1 and down 21% from the 1.9m in Q2 ’09.

PS3 software unit sales recorded notable growth jumping 48% to 35.3m from 23.9m a year ago.  Meanwhile sales of both PSP and PS2 software have declined.  PSP software sales totalled 11m down 15% from the 13m in Q2 ’09.  PS2 software unit sales fell 51% to 5.6m from 11.4m last year.

Sources: Sony

Exchange rates used above as at 30th September 2010 – Â¥131 = £1 (BBC Market Data), Â¥83 = $1 (Sony)

18 Comments

  1. Woop Woop. Bicuits all round then for Sony. Good news, hopefully this means apple will rethink they’re buy out madness from the other day.

    • I’d even go so far as to suggest Hobnobs.

      • Chocolate digestives!

      • Oh god why? chocolate hobnobs of course!

    • I agree, chocolate hobnobs for the win.. and I think Sony can buy seeing as they are now raking it in!

  2. What a difference a year makes. Good work Sony.

  3. yeah finally their hard work is paying off

  4. Yay victory comes to the patient

  5. One thing that strikes me as strange, is that, back in 2007, Sony said that they were not worried about 360’s big sales gap and that buy 2009 and 2010 they woud be seeing good sales and profits. It’s straneg just how right they were, surely Sony must have an oracle or a seer on their payroll. Despite their slow start with PS3 they pretty much always seem to end up golden!

  6. Well done Sony. They deserve a pat on the back ;)

  7. Your welcome Sony, how about repaying me with some descent Playstation plus games that I dont already own?

    • I’ve never done this before but.. *facepalm*

  8. Great news to see them doing well as of recent. Still very disappointing to see such a massive majority from the last generation utterly shat upon which leaves them in 3rd position (at present) behind MS and Nintendo for global sales.

    I want those hobnobs to taste every bit as lovely as the next guy but I hope Sony are thinking about the entire situation and not just year to year.

    • i believe Sony has learned a lot in this gemeration

  9. of course it’s looking good for them, they got all my money!

    bloody great game making bastards!

  10. I think it’s helped lots but the slim and the amount of exclusives they have had recently. Although I do wonder how many people still have their original 60GB ps3 in working order…

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